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THE LIFE 



OF 



MARIE ANTOINETTE 



Volume I. 



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Ccotoneti bp t|)e acaH^tnte JTran^atse 



THE LIFE 



OF 



MARIE ANTOINETTE 



BY 

MAXIME DE LA ROCHETERIE 



Craiwlatrt from if)t Jrtndj 

BY 

CORA HAMILTON BELL 



in two volumes 
Vol. L 



NEW YORK 
DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 

1895 



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157. \ 
V.I 



Copyri^t, 189S, 
By Dodd, Mead and Company. 

Ail rights reserved. 



John Wilson and Son, Cambridge, U.S.A. 



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PREFACE. 



J-JA VING been commissioned by the " Revue des Ques- 
tions Historiques,'' some years ago, to write a review 
of " The Correspondence of the Comte de Mercy with Maria 
Theresa'' which had then just appeared, I made tlie follow- 
ing statement : — 

** The exact historical truth is to be found in these reports 
of Mercy, and is a mean between the mass of partisan as- 
sertions of Madame Campan, Weber, and Montjoye on 
the one hand, and the calumnies and coarse insinuations 
of Besenval, Lauzun, and Soulavie, on the other, — between 
the systematic aspersion of her enemies and the almost 
superstitious enthusiasm of her friends ; somewhere be- 
tween the libel and the legend, but on the whole nearer the 
legend. Marie Antoinette was not a sinner, neither was 
she a saint. She was a pure and charming woman, 
somewhat heedless and frivolous, but always chaste; a 
queen somewhat too hot-headed in the patronage site 
bestowed, and inconsiderate in her political actions, but 
proud and energetic ; a true queen, by reason of the dig- 
nity of her bearing and the splendour of her majesty ; a 
true woman, in virtue of the seductiveness of her manners 

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VI PREFACE 

and the tenderness of lier heart, till she became a martyr^ 
through the extremity of her trials and her triumphant 
deathr ' 

Fifteen years of conscientious research, the examination 
of new and important documefits, — such as the " Papers of 
Count Fersen',' " The Correspondence of Baron de Stdely' 
that of Count von Goltz, that of Mercy with Joseph II. 
and KaunitZy " The Memoirs of the Duchesse de Tourzel,' 
etc, — have not changed my opinion ; and I repeat now 
what I wrote in 1874. 

The same qualities that mark the first ten years of Marie 
Antoinettes life in France are to be found during the last 
thirteen, and till the fatal \tth of October, 1 793, with only 
such changes as age, experience, maternity, and, above all, 
misfortune, were bound to bring, 

I have sought to present them as they appeared to me after 
much study and comparison of texts, bearing in mind as far 
as possible not only the first, but the secondary causes that 
produced them, 

I have not suppressed either mistakes or faults, having no 
other desire but to discover the truth, and no other ambition 
but to speak it. 

Have I succeeded? It is for my readers to decide. 

1 Revue des Questions Historiques, April, 1874, p. 594. 



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CONTENTS. 

VOLUME I. 



PAGS 

Introduction xiii 



CHAPTER I. 

Birth of Marie Antoinette. — The Duke von Tarouka. — The Poet 
Metastasio. — Education. — The Countess von Brandeiss. — The 
Countess von Lerchenfeld. — Death of Francis I. ; his Instruc- 
tions to his Children. — The AbW de Vermond. — Celebration of 
the Betrothal. — Departure of Marie Antoinette. — The Empress's 
Counsel to her Daughter 



CHAPTER II. 

The Dauphiness of France. — Strasburg. — Nancy. — Rheims. — Com- 
pi^ne. — Portrait of the Dauphiness. — Marie Antoinette at St. 
Denys. — Supper at La Muette with Madame du Barry. — Celebra- 
tion of the Marriage at Versailles. — The Pretensions of the Prin- 
cesses of the House of Lorraine. — Celebrations in Paris. — The 
Catastrophe on La Place Louis XV. — Letter from the Dauphin to 
the Lieutenant of the Police 15 



CHAPTER III. 

The Royal Family in 1770. —The King. — Mesdames. — The Comte de 
Provence. — The Comte d'Artois. — Mesdames Clotilde and Elisa- 
beth. — The Dauphin 29 



CHAPTER IV. 

Intrigues at Court — Rival Parties. — Espionage of the Due de la Vau- 
guyon. — The Successful D^but of the Dauphiness. — The Com- 
tesse de Gramont. — One of Marie Antoinette's Days ; her 
Reading. — Counsels of Maria Theresa. — After Some Resistance 
the Dauphiness follows them 38 



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vm CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER V. 

PAGB 

What must be thought of Maria Theresa's Reproofs. — The Counsellors 
of Marie Antoinette. — The Comte de Mercy ; his Means of Infor- 
mation. — The Abb6 de Vermond — Marie Antoinette's Fondness 
for Riding. — The Influence of Mesdames. — How this Influence 
was gained. — The Household of the Dauphiness. — The Comtesse 
de Noailles. — Madame I'fitiquette. — The Comtesse de Coss6 and 
the Comtesse de Mailly. — The Taking of the Veil by Madame 
Louise. — The Disadvantage of the Influence of Mesdames upon 
their Niece. — The Comtesse de Narbonne and the Marquise de 
Durfort. — The Relation of the King and Marie Antoinette. — Dimi- 
nution of the Influence of Mesdames. — The Dissatisfaction of 
Madame Adelaide ; her Spitefulness 48 



CHAPTER VI. 

Disgrace of the Due de Choiseul; his Triumphant Exile; his Char- 
acter. — Fall of the Parliaments. — Discontent of the People. — The 
Due d'Aiguillon. — The Comtesse du Barry. — The Proud Attitude 
of the Dauphiness toward the Favourite. — The King is displeased 
by it. — Remonstrances from Maria Theresa. — Letter from Kau- 
nitz to Mercy. — Direct Intervention of Louis XV. -^ Insistence on 
the Part of the Empress. — Lively Letters exchanged between 
Mother and Daughter. — Madame du Barry seeks to propitiate the 
Dauphiness ; she fails. — In this Conflict, History shows Marie 
Antoinette to have been in the Right 61 



CHAPTER VII. 

Popularity of the Dauphiness. — Traits of Kindness. — The Peasant of 
Ach^res. — The Burning of the H6tel Dieu. — Entrance of the Dau- 
phin and Dauphiness into Paris. — The Universal Enthusiasm. — 
Letter from Marie Antoinette to her Mother. — Representations at 
the Com^die Fran(;aise and at the Comddie Italienne. — The Comte 
de Provence and the Comte d'Artois; their Marriages, their Re- 
lations with the Dauphiness. — The Amusements of the Young 
Couples. — Comedy in their Private Apartments. — The Intimacy of 
the Dauphin and the Dauphiness. — The Dauphin becomes less 
Timid, the Dauphiness more Thoughtful. — The Assured Position 
of Marie Antoinette at the Court m the Beginning of May, 1774 . 76 



CHAPTER VIII. 
Death of Louis XV . 9> 

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CONTENTS. ix 



CHAPTER IX. 

PAGB 

Beginning of the Reign of Louis XVI. — Difficulties of the Situation. — 
The Hopes of the Public. — Popularity of the New Sovereigns. — 
Maurepas made Minister. — Fall of the Old Ministers. — Return of 
Choiseul. — The Politic Attitude of the Queen ; her Repugnance to 
Business. — Maria Theresa, Mercy, and Vermond urge her to attend 
to it — Marie Antoinette resists their Advice. — Suppers at the 
Court. — Etiquette. — The Queen emancipates herself from it. — 
The Inconveniences that result from this Freedom. — The Inocula- 
tion of the King 96 

CHAPTER X. 

The New Ministry. — Du Muy. — Turgot. — Vergennes. — Recall of the 
Parliament. — Marie Antoinette, Queen of Fashion and Taste. -.- 
Mademoiselle Bertin. — The Coiffure. — Amusements at Court. — 
The Enthusiasm of Horace Walpole. — Moderation of the Queen in 
her Tastes ; her Popularity. — Representations of Gluck's " Iphi- 
genia." — Goodness of the Queen. — Messieurs d'Assas, de Belle- 
garde, de Castelnau, de Pontecoulant. — Disagreements in the Royal 
Family. — First Calumnies. — Beaumarchais and the Jew, Ange- 
lucci. — Journey of the Archduke Maximilian. — Questions of Pre- 
cedence. — Mistakes of the Archduke. — The Nickname of the 
"Austrian." — Marie Antoinette no longer knows German ... 112 



CHAPTER XI. 

Coronation of the King. — Celebrations at Rheims. — Emotion of the 
Queen ; her Letter to the Empress. — Marriage of Madame Clotilde. 
— Renewed and Vain Efforts to recall Choiseul. — Trial of the 
Comte de Guines. — Exile of the Due d'Aiguillon. — Nomination 
of Malesherbes. — Reforms of Turgot ; Complaints which they 
Aroused. — Fall of Turgot. — The Share which the Queen had in 
it. — Letter of Mercy to Maria Theresa 127 



CHAPTER XII. 

Period of Dissipation. — Horse-Races. — Hunts in the Bois de Bou- 
logne. — Sleigh- Rides. — Visits to Paris. — Balls at the Opera. — 
The Adventure of Monsieur. — The Queen in a Cab ; her Neglect of 
Etiquette. — The Unfortimate Condescension of the King. — Expen- 
ditures of the Queen ; her Jewels. — Play. — The Bankers at Fon- 
tainebleau. — Despite Everything the Queen remains Faithful to her 
Habits of Piety. — What Mercy thinks of the Character and Con- 



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CONTENTS. 



duct of Marie Antoinette during this Period. — Opinion of the 
Prince de Ligne. — Opinion of the Count von Goltz. — A Page from 
the Comte d'Haussonville 138 



CHAPTER XIII. 

The Companions of the Queen. — The Princesse de Lamballe ; her 
Appointment as Superintendent of the Household of the Queen. — 
The Comtesse de Dillon. — The Princesse de Gu^mdn^e. — The 
Comtesse Jules de Polignac. — Favours granted to the Polignac 
Family. — The Polignac Set. — The Comte de Vaudreuil. — The 
Comte d*Adh^mar. — The Baron de Besenval. —The Due de Guines. 

— The Due de Lauzun. — Foreigners. — La Marck. — Esterhazy. — 
Stedingk. — Fersen. — Rivalry of the Favourites. — Decline in Favour 
of the Princesse de Lamballe. — Increasing Influence of Madame de 
Polignac; Disadvantages of this Influence. — The Queen cannot 
resist the Solicitations of her Friends. — True Causes of the Dissi- 
pation of Marie Antoinette 150 

CHAPTER XIV. 

Trianon. — The King gives the Queen Little Trianon. — The Chateau. 

— The Gardens. — The Exotic Trees. — The River. — The The- 
atre. — The Temple of Love. — The Belvedere. — The Grotto. — 
The Hamlet. — The Dairy. — Travellers' Opinions of Trianon. — 
Arthur Young. — The Russian Karamsine. — The Baroness von 
Oberkirche. — The Prince de Ligne. — The Apartments : the Dining- 
Room ; the Little Salon ; the Bath- Room; the Boudoir; the Queen's 
Chamber. — Marie Antoinette and the Arts. — The Marie Antoi- 
nette Style. — The Queen's Apartments at Fontainebleau. — Life of 
the Queen at Trianon. — Entertainments in Honour of Illustrious 
Visitors. — Marie Antoinette and Literature. — Music. — Gluck and 
Piccini. — Gr^try. — Sali^ri. — The Theatre. — The Queen's Com- 
pany. — Comedy at Trianon. — The Expenses of Trianon. — The 
Disadvantages of Trianon 1 70 

CHAPTER XV. 

Joseph II. 's Journey to France. — Character of the Emperor; his Plan 
of the Journey formed, abandoned, taken up again. — The Queen's 
Joy on seeing her Brother. — First Interviews. — Reprimands often 
Maladroit. — The Emperor and the Queen at the Opera. —Visits to 
the Monuments and Principal Institutions of the City of Paris. — 
Affectation of Simplicity. — Enthusiasm of the Public. — Departure 
of the Emperor ; his Opinion of the Queen. — Advice which he left 
her in Writing. — The Queen conforms to it during a time, then falls 
again into Dissipation. — Why ? 198 



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CONTENTS. XI 



CHAPTER XVI. 

PAGB 

The War of Succession in Bavaria. — Death of the Elector. — Joseph 
II. occupies Lower Bavaria ; his Mother's Disapproval of it — Arma- 
ments of Frederick II. — Feeling in France. — Maria Theresa 
implores her Daughter*s Intervention. — Futile Negotiations. — 
Declaration of War. — Marie Antoinette demands the Mediation of 
France ; Sudden Cessation of her Appeals. — Interview with Mau- 
repas. — Statement of the Comte de la Marck and of the Count von 
Goltz. — The True Extent of the Queen's Intervention in the Affair 
of Bavaria. — The Peace of Teschen 215 



CHAPTER XVII. 

The First Pregnancy of the Queen; her Happiness; her Plans for the 
Education of her Child. — The King's Joy. — Various Sentiments 
of the Royal Family and of the Court. — Malicious Remarks. — 
Dramatic Confinement of the Queen. — The Birth of Madame Royale. 
— Joy of the Public mingled with Disappointment. — The Queen's 
Words to her Daughter. — Te Deum in Notre Dame. — An Im- 
provement in the Conduct of the Queen, despite Certain Inevi- 
table Relapses. — Intimacy of Husband and Wife. — Marie Antoi- 
nette's Affection for Madame Elisabeth. — Impatience of Maria 
Theresa and the French People to have a Dauphin. — Miscarriage 
of the Queen. — Death of Maria Theresa. — Grief of Marie Antoi- 
nette. — Second Visit of Joseph II. to France. — Birth of the Dau- 
phin. — Universal Rejoicing 229 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

War in America. — Franklin's Mission. — War declared. — The Queen 
favourable to the Americans. — Protectress of Lafayette. — Her 
Anxieties during the War. — She is Desirous of an Honourable 
Peace. — The Peace of 1 783 ; its Consequences. — Princely Visit- 
ors. — The Princesses of Hesse-Darmstadt. — The Comte and the 
Comtesse du Nord. — Entertainments at Trianon and Chantilly. — 
The King of Sweden. — Prince Henry of Prussia. — Birth of the 
Due de Normandie. — Bankruptcy of the Prince de Gu^m^n^. — The 
Duchesse de Polignac made Governess to the Children of France . 250 



CHAPTER XIX. 

The Queen in Politics ; her Natural Distaste for Affairs. — Distrust of 
Maurepas. — Letter from the Queen to Joseph II. — Appointment 
of Messieurs de S^gur and de Castries. — The Queen's Sympathy for 



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xii CONTENTS. 



Necker ; she supports him in the Publication of his Accounts. — The 
Fall of Necker. — The Death of Maurepas. — Joly de Fleury. — 
D'Ormesson. — Calonne. — The Small Part that Marie Antoinette 
took in the Nomination of the Latter ; her Dislike of him. — Aus- 
trian Politics. — The Election of Maximilian at Cologne. —The 
Dispute of Joseph II. with Holland. — "The Marriage of Figaro." 
— The Queen plays " The Barber of Seville " at Trianon ... 267 



CHAPTER XX. 
Lawsuit of the Necklace 287 



CHAPTER XXI. 

Last Days of Happiness. — Journey to Cherbourg. — The Court at Fon- 
tainebleau in 1786. — The Goodness of the Queen. — Marie Antoi- 
nette and her Children. — The Sons of the Marquise de Bombelles 
and of the Marquise de Sabran. — Days of Sorrow. — Scenes at 
Trianon described by Madame Campan. — Calumny. — Pamphlets 
and Songs. — Visit of the Archduke Ferdinand, and of the Duchess 
of Saxe-Teschen. — Acquisition of St. Cloud. — " Madame Deficit." 
— Calonne and the Queen. — Representation of "Athalie." — The 
Portrait of the Queen is not exhibited. — Estrangement from the 
Polignacs. — The Death of Sophie Beatrix 320 



CHAPTER XXn. 

The Notables. — Fall of Calonne. — Brienne ; his Reforms ; his Unpopu- 
larity recoils upon the Queen. — Recall of Necker. — Convocation of 
the States-General. — A Flood of Brochures. — Deceit of Thiers. — 
Situation of Marie Antoinette in 1789 in Relation to the Royal Fam- 
ily. — The Comte and Comtesse de Provence. — The Comte and 
Comtesse d'Artois. — Madame Elisabeth. — Madame. — The Con- 
dds. — - The Due d'OrMans 332 



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INTRODUCTION. 



" TF ever a nation were justified in being astonished by an 
1 event, it was by the alliance between the king and the 
empress-queen, concluded in 1756." 

It was in these words that the Due de Choiseul, minister of 
foreign affairs, summed up this important event in his instruc- 
tions to the Comtc de Choiseul in 1759. who had been appointed 
ambassador to Vienna, after having been one of the chief pro- 
moters of the change brought about in the policy of France 
during the eighteenth century ; and so profound was his convic- 
tion that he repeated the same opinion again twice in the same 
terms, — once in 1761 to the Comte du ChAtelet, and in 1766 to 
the Marquis de Durfort. 

The change was, indeed, a radical one; and public astonish- 
ment must have been great. For more than two centuries France 
had been accustomed to regard Austria as her perpetual enemy. 
Freed from anxiety on the score of England, — who had been her 
hereditary foe during the whole of the Middle Ages, but who had 
been definitely driven across the Channel by the glorious career 
of Jeanne d'Arc, and later by the capture of Calais by Francois de 
Guise, — she had been obliged from the beginning of modern times 
to fight not only for her power, but for her very existence, against 
the double menace of the Hapsburgs, who in their two branches, 
the Spanish and Austrian, threatened her on the north, south, 
and east. To break this belt, which was strangling us ; to push 
back to the natural frontiers the advance posts which the king 
of Spain on the one side, and the emperor on the other, had 
gained on our territory ; to reconquer our liberty of movement, 



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XIV INTRODUCTION. 



and to assure to the crown of France ** the superior r61e which 
belonged to it by right of its antiquity, dignity, and grandeur," 
— such was the object pursued with patient obstinacy and patri- 
otic cunning by all the princes since Francis I. and the great 
ministers who had served them. For a time eclipsed rather than 
given up during the religious disputes under the last of the 
Valois, the struggle broke out again with renewed energy under 
the Bourbons. This struggle for existence was the cause of vari- 
ous alliances which must have been repugnant to his Most 
Christian Majesty, but which necessity imposed upon him, — the 
alliances with the Sultan, and with the Protestants of Germany and 
Holland, who, being hostile to Spain and Austria, were naturally 
useful allies for us. And it was thus under the protection of 
France that the grandeur of the HohenzoUern, who from elec- 
tors of Brandenburg became kings of Prussia, was founded and 
developed. 

But the situation was changed. The conquests of Richelieu 
and Mazarin, assured by the treaties of Westphalia and of the 
Pyrenees, the victories of Louis XIV., and even his defeats, which 
resulted in the peace of Utrecht, had transformed the map of 
Europe. The House of Austria was forever expelled from Spain, 
where it had been replaced by the Bourbons ; and if it continued 
to be a danger to us because of its possessions in Italy, and, above 
all, because of its domain in the Low Countries, where the coali- 
tion had obviously placed it as an advance-guard against us, and 
because of its alliance with England (who, though kindly disposed 
toward Louis XIV. under the Stuarts, had, with the accession of 
George IIL and the House of Hanover, resumed all her old anti- 
French traditions), the treaties of Vienna and of Aix-la-Chapelle, 
evicting it from Naples and Parma, and the treaty of Belgrade, 
reducing it on the east, had essentially weakened its prestige, 
while increasing that of Prussia. 

Was it wise to push our revenge further, to pursue to extinc- 
tion our old adversary, already sufficiently humiliated, in order to 
raise on the ruins a young, restless, and warlike power, whose 
leader, governed by his ambitions and held in check only by his } 1 

interests, had from the start shown himself a fractious and dis- ^ 

loyal ally? Was it necessary, out of pretended respect for tradi- * / 

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INTRODUCTION. xv 



tional policy, but in reality from mere routine, to persist in a 
system whose good efiects had already been enjoyed ; or would 
it not be better, by ending a struggle which for the future would 
)e without object, to guarantee the results already acquired, and 
assure the equilibrium obtained? 

For some time observant persons might have noted a decrease 
in the feud between the Houses of France and Austria. The 
Emperor Charles VI., cured of his ideas of conquest, and enlight 
cned by his last defeats, had been contemplating a reconciliation 
with France ; and Cardinal Fleury was by no means disposed to 
reject his overtures. " He thought," as some one has justly 
remarked, *' that France and Austria having both reached their 
full development, it would be wiser to seek to assure their pawer 
than to extend it; and that by uniting they could exercise a 
pacific influence over the rest of Europe." The indorsement by 
Versailles of the Pragmatic Sanction, which assured the succes- 
sion of the Hapsburgs, seemed the consecration of this policy of 
peace; and even the treaty of Belgrade, wherein French influence, 
exerted for the benefit of Turkey, checkmated the projects of 
the emperor, did not alter the aspect of aff'airs. An active cor- 
respondence was established between Charles VI. and Fleury; 
and if we may believe the testimony of an unprejudiced witness, 
Frederick II., these intimate relations were on the point of result- 
ing in the peaceful surrender of the grand duchy of Luxembourg 
to the king. It is asserted that before dying the emperor recom- 
mended his daughter to ally herself with France. 

As for Louis XV., his naturally keen intelligence often com- 
prehended the part it would be wise for him to play, though his 
lack of energy often made him fail to undertake it; and in this 
instance he shared the views of his minister, and leaned visibly 
toward an understanding with the court of Vienna. We read in 
the instructions given to the Comte d'Estrees " that the king 
had for a long time chafed at the prejudices against the establish- 
ment of a policy which would satisfy his heart, and which seemed 
to him more fitting than another for the maintenance of the only 
true religion and the general peace, and for the curbing of the 
ambition of each prince within the limit and power of his par- 
ticular estate." 



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XVI INTRODUCTION. 

The unfortunate war of the Austrian succession, in which the 
Cabinet of Versailles, urged by Frederick II., incited by the mili- 
tary faction and its chief, the Mar^chal de Belle-Isle, and 
encouraged by public opinion, which was still imbued with the 
old prejudices, broke its promises. This war, which seemed to 
add but another to Austria's grievances against France, did not, 
however, put an end to her desire for a reconciliation. It seemed, 
on the contrary, to increase it by all the passion of revenge which 
Maria Theresa felt for the king of Prussia The loss of Silesia, 
brutally seized without any declaration of hostilities, seemed 
much more bitter to her than the surrender of Parma and Plai- 
sance. Even during the war itself she had on various occasions, 
and either directly or through the intervention of the court of 
Dresden, made overtures of peace to France in particular, even 
offering to cede certain places in the Low Countries, provided 
that the king would only remain neutral between her and 
the king of Prussia. After the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle, 
the overtures were continued, and, we are bound to say, were 
reciprocated. 

While the Count von Kaunitz, who was ambassador to Paris 
from 175 1 to 1753, before he became the director of the Austrian 
policy, — which position he held for more than forty years, — was 
exerting himself to establish cordial relations with the cabinet 
of Versailles, and succeeded to a certain degree, the instructions 
given to the French ministers sent to Vienna bore the impress 
of a like good-will. The minister of state for foreign affairs, 
Monsieur de Puysieux, wrote in 1750: — 

" The Marquis d'Hautefort will be careful in his conversations with the 
imperial ministers, when the fitting occasion arises, to say that the king 
is by no means affected by the ancient prejudices which since the time of 
Charles V. have made the House of France regard the House of Austria 
as her dangerous and implacable rival ; that the hostility between these 
two great powers should no longer be a reason of state ; and that his 
Majesty, on the contrary, is convinced that they would find their safety 
and mutual convenience in a sincere alliance and a perfect understanding 
which might be cemented between the two kingdoms ; that this under- 
standing, once established, would prevent future wars, which, by exhausting 
the treasuries of the sovereigns, are always so unfortunate for the nations 



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INTRODUCTION. xvii 



i 



who are their victims ; that the engagements which the king would enter 
into with the court of Vienna, having no other end or motive but the 
public peace, would in no wise be incompatible with those which the two 
courts had ahready entered upon with other powers." 

The same language was used three years later to the Marquis 
d'Aubeterre, who succeeded the Marquis d'Hautefort: — 

" There is no question to-day of the famous quarrels of Francis I. and 
Charles V. Circumstances have changed ; the king's only desire is to 
live in harmony with the empress-queen. No trace of those antiquated 
grievances remains in his Majesty's heart. He is wholly disposed to 
contribute to the advantages of their Imperial Majesties." 

In any case, this idea of a reconciliation with Austria, as the in- 
structions to Monsieur d'Hautefort prove, did not go as far as the 
breaking of other alliances. The king of France remained what 
he had been since the treaty of Westphalia, — the protector of 
the German Confederation ; though the friend of Austria, he had 
no intention of sacrificing Prussia to her. Prussia was a power 
which had sprung up under his patronage ; he would not aban- 
don it. But finding that the young power was well grown, that 
it was becoming restless, factious, discontented, and inclined to 
brave its tutor, and, if need were, supplant him, he thought it time 
to check a development which, under the young successor of 
Frederick William, might become threatening. It was futile for 
France to regard Germany as a devoted ally, and it was foolish 
to raise up there a new rival. ** If it were not to the honour or 
glory of France to deliver over the king of Prussia to the wrath 
of the court of Vienna, neither could she allow the elector of 
Brandenburg to usurp the position occupied in Europe by the 
king of France." 

Things were at this pass, the two governments being obviously 
ahead of public opinion in their respective countries, and therefore 
limited to mere coquetry and civility, when, in the beginning of 
September, 1755, the Count von Stahremberg, Austrian ambas- 
sador in Paris, asked for an interview with Madame de Pompa- 
dour, in order to acquaint her with certain secret propositions 
with which the empress had charged him. It is said that Maria 

VOL. I. — d 



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xviii INTRODUCTION. 



Theresa, being desirous above all things that these negotiations 
should prove successful, and knowing the preponderating influence 
of the favourite, had not hesitated to write her a letter wherein 
she had carried her condescension to the point of addressing her 
as "dear friend." This is but tradition; and Maria Theresa her- 
self took pains to deny it in a letter to the wife of the elector of 
Saxony. But what the empress had not done, the ambassador 
did not hesitate to do; and it was through the intervention of 
Madame de Pompadour that he presented the propositions. 
He had asked that the king appoint one of his ministers to be 
present at this first conference, who should afterward serve as 
intermediary. The king named the Abb^ de Bernis; and 
although the favourite declared that this choice was spontaneous, 
it is difficult to believe that she did not at least suggest the name 
of this man, who was not a member of the Council, but who, she 
knew, was wholly devoted to her. This appointment also served 
to conceal from the ministers, whose prejudices against Austria 
were well known, a proposition which appealed to the secret desire 
of the king. 

After some objections Bernis accepted the mission confided to 
him ; and his interviews with the Austrian ambassador began on 
the following day. They took place in a little house situated below 
the Terrace of Bellevue, the name of which, Babiole, served as 
a subject of pleasantry to the friends of Frederick II. Madame 
de Pompadour was present at the first; the others took place 
between Bernis and Stahremberg alone. There was not even a 
secretary to do the writing. ** The intention of the empress was 
to negotiate, as it were, tete-d-tite with the king." Maria Theresa, 
Joseph II., and Kaunitz, at Vienna, and at Versailles the king 
and Madame de Pompadour, were alone in the secret. It was 
not until after nearly three months that the French ministers, or 
at least some of them, were initiated. As to the foreign ministers, 
" the secret was so well guarded," writes Bernis, ** that during 
more than six months they did not even suspect the understand- 
ing existing between us." Every evening Bernis submitted to the 
king the results of the day, and had him approve all the answers 
and memoirs which he transmitted to Stahremberg. 

Despite his sovereign's passionate desire to reach a conclusion, 



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INTRODUCTION. xix 



the French negotiator proceeded with the greatest precaution ; he 
was always afraid of a snare. The very frankness and abandon 
with which the imperial government set forth its projects and 
disclosed its views put him on guard against their sincerity. 
The propositions of Maria Theresa offered real advantages for 
France, the House of Bourbon, and the peace of Europe ; but 
they necessitated such a radical change of policy that Bernis 
hesitated to agree to them. The king would have accepted them 
more quickly ; but he respected the motives of his plenipoten- 
tiary, and left him free to act. The response to the first overtures 
of Stahremberg was reserved, almost cold; they intrenched 
themselves behind the stipulations of Aix-la-Chapelle, and 
the negotiations were dragging along, when an unexpected 
discovery came to change the face of things, and hasten the 
conclusion. 

On the first day, — and it was one of the chief facts on which 
he based his argument, — the ambassador had averred that since 
the month of August the king of Prussia had been negotiating a 
treaty with -England by means of the intervention of the Duke of 
Brunswick. But how could one believe in this defection? Our 
diplomats knew nothing of it. Was not this a trap which was 
baited by the excitement of our legitimate anger? The king of 
Prussia had been bound to us for fourteen years by a treaty 
which had still some months to run. How could one suppose 
that at the moment of renewing it (for nothing had shown any 
inclination on his part to break it) he would ally himself with 
England, at that time the faithful friend of Austria, and our tradi- 
tional enemy, — particularly at a moment when a fresh conflict 
had just broken out between the two ancient rivals? On the 8th 
of June, 1755, in fact, in the midst of peace and without any 
declaration of hostility, the English fleet had seized two French 
ships, the " Alcide " and the ** Lys." The insult had been keenly 
resented in France, and the Prussian minister in Paris, the Baron 
von Knyphausen, outdoing the French in his indignation, went 
about repeating that such an aggression was intolerable, and that 
it should be punished without delay, by attacking both England 
and her ally, Austria, even offering the assistance of his master, 
who was ready to enter Bohemia with forty thousand men. The 



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XX INTRODUCTION. 



Cabinet, not being ready, resisted these instigations, and con- 
tented itself with sending a remonstrance to the Cabinet of 
London, abstained from all reprisals, but none the less continued 
its preparations for war, which every day seemed more inevitable. 
How could one believe that Frederick would choose precisely 
this moment to abandon his faithful ally, who had just been 
brutally insulted, and draw near to the aggressor against whom 
he was manifesting his disapproval so noisily? 

However strange and improbable Stahremberg's revelation 
seemed, it was necessary to investigate it. An ambassador extra- 
ordinary, the Due de Nivernais, was sent to Berlin under pretext 
of examining with the king of Prussia the manner of renewing 
the treaty of 174 1, in reality to discover his true sentiments, and in 
a way to feel his puke in this serious juncture. Grand seigneur 
in every sense of the term, but liberal, a man of the world and of 
the best society, with an open and enlightened mind, a poet at 
times, and a member of the French Academy, a partisan of 
Prussia, like most of the courtiers of that period, — the Due de 
Nivernais could not but be persona grata at Berlin. The king 
received him well, welcomed him both as plenipotentiary and as 
academician, heard his views, listened to his propositions, over- 
whelmed him with civilities, protested his attachment to France, 
strengthened his confidence, hoodwinked his perspicacity, and 
one fine day announced to him cynically that his minister to 
London had just signed a treaty of alliance with England. Despite 
the efforts which the duke made to persuade him not to ratify 
an act which at that moment was a veritable betrayal of us, he 
confirmed it in a way, under his eyes, on Feb. 16, 1756, offering 
as compensation to sign one with us, which, as Bernis remarked, 
seemed like derision ; and to all the remonstrances of the pleni- 
potentiary he only replied by pleasantry. ** You are very angry," 
he said, laughing; "why don't you make a treaty with the 
empress? I should not mind." 

During this time the conferences of Bellevue, embarrassed by 
the first reply of Bernis, progressed but slowly. There was no 
question, moreover, of anything between France and Austria but 
a simple guatantee treaty, in which the French negotiator insisted 
upon having the Prussian king included. The news of Frederick's 



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INTRODUCTION. xxi 



treachery precipitated matters. ** France could not remain with- 
out alliances ; and, abandoned by Prussia, she was obliged to ally 
herself with the court of Vienna, or remain exposed to the league 
of the great powers of Europe." The negotiations, for a time 
interrupted by the illness of Bernis, resulted at last, on May i, 
1756, in an alliance defensive and neutral. 

This step gave rise to much controversy and severe criticism, 
both on its conclusion and later. The authors of memoirs, who 
were devoted to the king of Prussia, the philosophers who were 
subsidized by him, the diplomats of the old school, whose ideas 
were thereby deranged, were not long in attacking this profound 
change in the policy of France. Frederick himself, in his 
*' Writings," posed as a victim. History, better understood, has 
shown the true value of the recriminations of this strange cham- 
pion of liberty and the rights of man. It has been clearly proved 
that it was he who first betrayed the alliance with France, and 
that the treaty of Versailles was but the perfectly legitimate 
response to the treaty of London. As for the consequences of 
this act, if they have not always been such as were prophesied 
and hoped for; if they have sometimes turned to the detriment 
of France and to the advantage of Austria; if they resulted in the 
disasters of the Seven Years' War, and the partition of Poland, — 
it was not the fault of the negotiators of the treaty of 1756, but 
of those who continued their work, and who did not know how 
to reap the natural and jdst fruit of it. As Bernis himself has 
rightly observed, ** The failure was due to our bad conduct, to 
the poor use we made of our forces, and to the intrigues which 
governed the choice of our leaders." 

But at the time when this treaty was concluded, it solved in the 
most satisfactory way a difficult and delicate situation. When a 
new war broke out with England, it deprived her of her most 
powerful auxiliary. It sustained the treaty of Westphalia, — the 
foundation of our influence in Germany. It did not drag us into 
the differences between Austria and Prussia, since, out of con- 
sideration for his former prot6g6, Louis XV. had expressly 
stipulated that no steps should be taken against the king of 
Prussia unless he violated the conditions of Aix-la-Chapelle. In 
thus destroying, or at least greatly diminishing, the chances of 



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xxii INTRODUCTION. 



a continental war, in securing our frontier to the north, and in 
uniting the two great powers, it gave us an opportunity to recon- 
struct our naval forces, and to give ourselves up entirely to the 
maritime struggle with our ancient rival. It even enabled us to 
establish peace more promptly and on a better foundation. 
** And thus," Bernis writes, ** the king ought to have played the 
most important political and military r61e in Europe without 
infringing upon right or justice." In the place of the doubtful 
friendship of the king of Prussia, — a factious and distrustful ally, 
strong indeed in the resources of his genius, but always ready to 
change sides in the interest of his ambition, — we substituted an 
alliance with a power of the first order, which, having resigned its 
pretensions to universal dominion, and retired within its proper 
limits, was no longer a danger, but a support. It was an act of 
wisdom, and, under the circumstances, an act of necessity. To 
speak truly, it was less the abandonment of the policy of 
Richelieu and of Louis XIV. than its fulfilment and consecration. 
**The greatest homage which Louis XV. could pay his predeces- 
sors," an eminent statesman has written, " was to recognize, as 
history should do to-day, that since they had pushed the claims 
of France against Austria to the uttermost, it was neither neces- 
sary nor prudent to push them further." 

And as if to cement this new policy, while the negotiations were 
pending in France which resulted in the treaty of Versailles, the 
empress in Austria gave birth to the*child who was one day to 
become the dearest bond of union and the living symbol of the 
alliance between the two countries. 



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LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 



CHAPTER I. 

Birth of Marie Antoinette. — The Duke von Tarouka. — The Poet 
Metastasio. — Education. — The Countess von Brandeiss. — 
The Countess von Lerchenfeld. — Death of Francis I. ; his 
Instructions to his Children. — The Abb^ de Vermond. — 
Celebration of the Betrothal. — Departure of Marie An- 
toinette. — The Empress's Counsel to her Daughter. 

MARIE ANTOINETTE JEANNE DE LORRAINE of 
Austria was born in Vienna on November 2, All Saints* 
Day, I75S. 

On the same day, as if misfortune wished from the first to put 
an indelible stamp upon the life which seemed to promise so bril- 
liantly and yet was destined to know so many reverses, a frightful 
earthquake visited central Europe, destroying Lisbon, chasing 
the future godfather and godmother of the child from their crum- 
bling palace, burying beneath the ruins thirty thousand men, and 
engulfing on the strand at Cadiz the heir to one of the most 
glorious names in French literature, — the grandson of the great 
Racine. 

The young archduchess was the sixth daughter and ninth child 
of Francis of Lorraine, Emperor of Germany, and of the illus- 
trious Maria Theresa. A story is told that one evening in the 
early autumn of 1755, when the empress was receiving at Schoen- 
brunn, she laughingly asked the Duke von Tarouka, " Shall I have 
a boy or a girl? " " A prince, without doubt, Madame," replied 
the courtier. " Well," Maria Theresa answered, " I wager two 
ducats that I shall give birth to a girl." Some time after, the 
child was born. The Duke von Tarouka lost; he sent the 
amount of the bet to the empress enclosed in this ingenious 
quatrain of the poet Metastasio : — 

VOL. I.— I 

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LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 



**^ Ho perduto : Taugusta figlia 
A pagar m' ha, condamnato. 
Ma s'e vero ch*a voi simiglia 
Tutto r mundo ha guadagnato." 

("I have lost: the august girl has condemned me to pay. But 
if it be true that she resembles you, then all the world has 
gained.") 

On November 3, the young princess was baptized by the arch- 
bishop of Vienna. Her godfather and godmother were the king 
and queen of Portugal, represented by the Archduke Joseph 
and the Archduchess Marie Anne. A solemn Te Deum was 
then sung; during two days the court was in full dress, and dur- 
ing one in semi-full dress; but the emperor — was it owing to 
some vague presentiment of the future? — could not bring him- 
self to give a great public banquet. Instead of this, there were 
two days of rejoicing, the Sth and 6th of November, with public 
shows and free passage through the gates of the city. The em- 
press, who was seriously indisposed after her confinement, did 
not celebrate her recovery in the court chapel until the 14th of 
December. 

From the hands of her nurse, Marie Constance Hoffman, wife 
of a councillor of the magistracy, Jean Georges Weber, the young 
archduchess presently passed into those of her governess, the 
Countess von Brandeiss. Life at Vienna was simple. " The 
imperial family," said Goethe, ** is nothing more than a large 
German bourgeoisie^ Etiquette was unknown. The emperor 
and empress liked to live in the midst of their subjects, kind 
and friendly toward all, but restraining familiarity by respect. 
Unfortunately they were so absorbed by the care of the policy 
and administration of their vast empire that they had little leisure 
to superintend the education of their numerous children. They 
confided them to tutors and governesses whom they chose with 
care, and to whom it appears they gave their instructions, with- 
out, however, seeing that they were carried out. 

With her ardent and pleasure-loving disposition, her affection- 
ate and sensitive heart, her mind, which was quick and subtle but 
difficult to hold, her obstinacy in having her own way, and her 
cleverness in eluding remonstrances, her taste for satire, in which 
she was encouraged by her sister Caroline, with whom she was 
educated till 1767, her fondness for amusements rather than 
serious studies. — Marie Antoinette did not find in her governess 

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EDUCATION. 



that grave and unwavering firmness which should have checked 
her frivolity and conquered her wilfulness. The Countess von 
Brandeiss loved her pupil very dearly, and her affection was 
warmly reciprocated by the charge whom she spoiled. If, per- 
chance, she tried to be severe, and reprimand her, a childish 
outbreak, a witticism, or a caress would easily overcome her 
momentary displeasure. Until her pupil attained the age of 
twelve, she was too little solicitous to inculcate that concentration 
of mind, regularity of work, and self-control without which even 
the most brilliant talents remain sterile; thus education failed 
to fecundate a mind which Nature had so richly dowered. 

The Countess von Lerchenfeld, who succeeded the Countess 
von Brandeiss in 1768, had greater strength of mind and more 
firmness of character; but being possessed of an unequal temper 
and delicate health, she could obviously have but little sympathy 
with the lively and ardent child under her care. Marie Antoinette 
grew up to be independent and gay, witty and charming, fasci- 
nating all who came near her by I know not what mixture of 
French petulance and German simplicity, but possessed rather 
of natural talents than acquired accomplishments. Messmer, the 
director of the Viennese schools, taught her to write; Metas- 
tasio taught her Italian ; Aufresne and Sainville, French pronun- 
ciation and declamation; Noverre, dancing; still others, music 
and drawing; but Maria Theresa complained that she did not 
profit sufficiently from these lessons. 

Although the young princess manifested great taste for music, 
a taste which continued during her whole life, and studied Latin 
without repugnance and Italian with pleasure; though she took 
an interest in history, provided that it was presented to her as an 
amusement and not as work, — she did not make equal progress 
in her other studies. Her handwriting was poor, and was not 
perfected until after she went to France. Her drawings fre- 
quently had to be retouched; and she took certain liberties with 
orthography, which, however, it is but fair to say, was a failing 
she shared in common with a great number of the distinguished 
women of her time. 

On the other hand, her judgment was good, her good-nature 
delightful, her sensibility always ready to do a kindness. One day 
when the empress was ill, some Hungarian officers were waiting 
in the antechamber for an opportunity to present a petition to her. 
Marie Antoinette saw them on her way to her mother's room. 



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LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 



'* Mamma," she said, " some of your friends are anxious about 
your health, and wish to see you/* ** Eh, who are these friends ? " 
" Some Hungarians." The chivalrous devotion of the Hungari- 
ans for their king, Maria Theresa, was well known. The empress 
understood what the archduchess had thus delicately insinuated, 
and the demand of the petitioners was granted. 

Another time, the winter having been excessively severe in 
Vienna, and all work consequently suspended, the suffering 
among the working classes was very great. As they were dis- 
cussing it one evening at the palace in the family drawing-room, 
Marie Antoinette approached her mother, and gave her a small 
box. ** There are fifty-five ducats," she said ; ** 't is all I have. 
Will you allow them to be distributed among the unfortunate 
sufferers?" 

Maria Theresa took them, and adding a larger sum to her 
daughter's savings, allowed the charitably minded girl to distribute 
the whole herself 

With this charming disposition of heart and mind, a bewitching 
spontaneity, which gave evidence of her delicate sensibility, with 
a childish expansiveness, which in no wis^ understood the for- 
malities of etiquette, and a naive sincerity, which the poisonous 
air of courts had not stifled, — Marie Antoinette, or rather Ma- 
dame Antoine, as she was called at the palace of Schoenbrunn, 
exercised over all who saw her an almost irresistible fascination. 
When, in 1766, Madame Geoffrin passed through Austria on her 
way to visit the king of Poland at Varsovie, — him whom she called 
her " Dear Son," — she stopped at Vienna, and was there very gra- 
ciously received. Maria Theresa was desirous of presenting to her 
her daughters, particularly her youngest. Madame Geoffrin was 
captivated. '* There is a child whom I should like to carry off 
with me!" she cried. "Take her; take her!" the empress re- 
plied gayly; and she recommended her visitor to write to France 
that she had seen the little one, and had found her beautiful. 
Madame Geoffrin was careful to do so : she described her sojourn 
in Vienna to her friend, Bautin the financier; and the salons of 
Paris began to talk of the beauty and grace of her who was soon 
to become the dauphiness of France. 

Sometimes, however, in the midst of her demonstrations of 
affection and her dreams of a glorious future for her daughter, 
the empress felt herself overcome by a gloomy presentiment; 
she would then draw the girl to her, and press her to her heart, 



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FRANCIS'S INSTRUCTIONS TO HIS CHILDREN. $ 

and say to her in a voice full of emotion, " My daughter, in the 
time of misfortune think of me." 

During her long life, so checkered and so glorious, Maria 
Theresa had many a time experienced the rude blows of grief; 
and the gay and light-hearted child, whose fair hair she kissed, 
was also to know to an uncommon degree the sorrows that may 
rend the heart of a queen. She had experienced a glimpse of 
them while still quite young: Marie Antoinette was but ten 
years old when her father set out for Innspruck, to be present at 
the marriage of his second son Leopold, grand-duke of Tuscany. 
Before his departure he called for his daughter, " took her on his 
knee and kissed her again and again with tears in his eyes, seem- 
ing very loath to leave her;" "I longed to kiss that child," he 
remarked. A few days after, on the i8th of August, 1765, Fran- 
cis of Lorraine had a stroke of apoplexy, while sitting at table 
during the wedding feast. 

In dying he left to his children, under the title, " Instructions to 
my ChildrenHboth for their Spiritual and Temporal Lives," some 
admirable counsel, bearmg the stamp of lofty wisdom and true 
Christian spirit ; but in which, faithful perhaps to the patriarchal 
customs of the House of Austria, he spoke as an individual rather 
than as a sovereign, as head of the family rather than as head of 
the empire. " *T is to prove to you after my death that I loved 
you during my lifetime that I leave to you these instructions, as 
rules by which you may regulate your conduct, and as precepts 
from which I have ever derived benefit." 

He exhorted them above all to remain sincere upholders of the 
Catholic faith and believers in God, " who alone can give us not 
only our eternal heritage, which is our real happiness, but our 
only true satisfaction in this world. ... It is an essential point, 
and one which I know not how to impress upon you strongly 
enough, never under any circumstances whatsoever to deceive 
yourselves about what is wrong, or try to think it innocent. . . . 
The world where you must pass your life is but transitory ; there 
is nought save eternity that is without end. Let this reflection 
prevent your fixing your affections upon anything here too 
strongly; but as God himself has sanctioned amusements, and 
that we should take delight in all that his bounty has so lavishly 
provided for the gratification of our senses, it is right for us to 
enjoy them according to his permission. . . . We should enjoy 
the pleasures of this life innocently ; for so soon as they lead us 



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LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 



into evil, of whatever sort it may be, they cease to be pleasures, 
and become a source of remorse and chagrin. , . . We are not 
put into this world for our pleasure only, and God has granted all 
these diversions but as a relaxation for the spirit. . . . When it 
is necessary to command, do not do so without previous consider- 
ation of what you command, and the reasons for and against, 
and then give the order gently. . . . Have no particular affection 
for any one thing, — above all, no passion, to which you should 
never abandon yourselves, for they all lead to unhappiness." 

Then, after recommending to his children " reserve and discre- 
tion, very necessary qualities," — for ** there is no use in saying all 
that one thinks," — and charity toward the poor, " which is a good 
deed in the sight of God, and makes one beloved in this world," 
he adds, — 

** The chief care of a sovereign should be not to burden his subjects 
in order to sustain a luxury which is not needful to the support and tran- 
quillity of these same subjects, nor to the preservation and good of the 
State. . . . 

" But I do not mean to say by that, that we should not live conformably 
to the state to which God has called us, and in which he wishes us to live 
according to his laws ; but the two are easily reconciled. . . . 

" Another thing which I believe necessary that I should recommend to 
you is that you should never be idle. The company which you keep is 
also a very delicate matter ; for often our companions lead us into many 
things into which we cannot fall as they. Every one should be on one's 
guard in this respect ; above all, persons like you, my children, should be 
careful, who are often surrounded by a crowd of people who seek but to 
flatter your inclinations, and lead them whither they think they tend, in 
order thus to pay court and win credit and favour without considering 
either your good or that of the world ; 't is sufficient for them if they gain 
either favour or money. 

" Friendship is a sweetener of life ; it is only necessary to be watchful 
where one places one's friendship, and not to be too prodigal of it ; for 
all the world does not make good use of it, and often there are false 
friends who seek but to profit by the confidence one reposes in them to 
abuse it, either for their own ends or otherwise, and thus do us much 
harm. Therefore I advise you, my dear children, never to be precipitate 
in placing your confidence in any one of whom you are not very sure, 
and whom you have not tested for a long time, for people in this world 
know how to dissemble for a long time." 

Finally, after having recommended to his children order, a wise 
economy, a horror of high play, harmony among themselves, and 



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THE BETROTHAL. 



an inviolable attachment to the head of the house, he traces for 
them a veritable, rule of life, year by year, week by week, day by 
day, hour by hour, and finishes with these grave words : — 

•' I recommend you to take two days in every year to prepare for death, 
as though you were sure that those two were the last days of your life ; 
and thus you will accustom yourself to know what you ought to do under 
those circumstances, and when your last moment arrives, you will not be 
surprised, but will know what you have to do. . . . You will recognize 
the utility of this by the practice of it, and it will do you an infinity of 
good without doing you any harm ; for you will be doing calmly what 
perhaps illness or lack of time may prevent your doing. 

" I herewith command you," he concluded, " to read these instructions 
twice yearly ;. they come from a father who loves you above everything, 
and who has thought it necessary to leave you this testimony of his tender 
affection, which you cannot better reciprocate than by loving one another 
with the same tenderness he bequeaths to all of you." 

Were these austere precepts followed ? Did Marie Antoinette, 
perchance, amid the splendours of Versailles and the allure- 
ments of the court, stop and lose herself in the contemplation 
of death ? We know not ; but does it not seem as though there 
were some mysterious divination of his daughter's future in this 
last counsel of the father? And does not the image of death, 
and of a frightful death, seem to follow with threat and jeer each 
step of the historian as he advances in the biography of this 
gracious and unfortunate queen? 

" Over what people wouldst thou like to reign ? " Maria 
Theresa asked Marie Antoinette one day. " Over the French," 
the child replied gayly, " because it was over them that Henri IV. 
and Louis XIV. reigned, — the Good and the Great." The ex- 
pression was happy ; and the empress was so delighted with it 
that she begged the French ambassador to communicate it im- 
mediately to the king, his master. The wishes of the daughter 
were in harmony with the policy of the mother in favouring a 
union which the king of France also desired no less than they. 

The arrangement was concluded long before it was announced. 
Louis XV. informed himself through his minister to Vienna, the 
Marquis de Durfort, of the progress and education of the arch- 
duchess. He sent the painter Ducreux from France to paint her 
portrait; and the portrait finished, he was in such haste to see it 
that the ambassador was obliged to send his son to carry it to 
Versailles. In Germany orders were given to repair the roads 



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LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 



along which the future dauphiness should travel into France. 
At* Vienna itself Maria Theresa surrounded her daughter with 
everything that might keep her in mind of France. She gave 
her a French coiffure ; she wished, above all, to give her a French 
education, and with this end in view she begged Choiseul to 
choose for her some clever and loyal tutor who could train the 
young princess in the usages and traditions of the court of France. 
Choiseul was undecided, when the archbishop of Toulouse, Lo- 
m^nie de Brienne, spoke to him of the Ahh6 de Vermond, libra- 
rian of the College des Quatre Natigns. The praise which the 
prelate bestowed upon his prot6g6 determined the minister's 
choice ; and a few days later the Abb^ de Vermond set out for 
Vienna, where he took official possession of his pcgst. 

The Abb6 de Vermond was of a grave and studious disposi- 
tion, not altogether disinterested, perhaps, but loyal, despite all 
that Madame Campan has said in her ** M^moires," wherein she 
sought to vilify him, no doubt from professional jealousy and 
because of the rivalry of their positions ; nor did he ever play 
that odious part toward his royal pupil of which the first waiting- 
woman has accused him. He did not seek, ** from cunning and 
wicked calculation, to keep her ignorant." His letters, which are 
now known, prove that he conscientiously fulfilled his mission, 
and that he exerted himself without ulterior motive to fill the 
gaps which the mistaken tenderness of the Countess von Brandeiss 
had left in the education of the archduchess. 

As soon as he arrived in Vienna he made out a plan of instruc- 
tion, which the empress approved. This embraced the study of 
the religion and history of France, with especial attention to the 
characteristic peculiarities of its habits and customs, an acquaint- 
ance with the great families, and, above all, with those whose 
members held offices about the court, a general survey of French 
literature, and particular application to the language and orthog- 
raphy. In order to make these studies interesting to a young 
girl who was little habituated to restraint, they were carried on 
as far as possible by conversation, — a tempting method, which 
had the advantage perhaps of instilling knowledge more easily 
into a mind so difficult to fix, but which had the serious dis- 
advantage of leaving uncorrected her very lack of industry, a 
fault inimical to any real progress. 

Sometimes, when he was tracing the general history of the 
French monarchy, the tutor would pause to sound the judgment 



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EDUCATION. 



of his pupil concerning the conduct of kings, and especially of 
queens; and he had the pleasure of finding that her judgment 
was almost always just. The young princess possessed a re- 
markably clear mind, but unfortunately was indolent in any sus- 
tained exercise of it. ** I cannot accu3tom her," the abb^ said, 
" to investigate any subject thoroughly, although I feel that she 
is quite capable of it." When one considers this, and the gibes 
of people who thought that the education of the archduchess 
was becoming too French, the natural jealousy with which the 
natives regarded a foreigner, the short time at Vermond's dis- 
posal, — only one hour a day at Vienna, — the obligatory dis- 
tractions of her life, which was beginning to be less secluded, it 
is easy to understand that the progress which the pupil made 
was not as rapid as the master desired. 

There was progress, however. At Schoenbrunn, where one 
was not so miserly of the hours devoted to study, they made up 
in the conversations for what had not been done in the regular 
lessons ; and when one day in the autumn of 1769, Maria Theresa 
descended to her daughter's room, and questioned her for nearly 
two hours, she declared herself satisfied with her improvement. 
She found her " entirely capable of reasoning and of judgment, 
above all, in matters of conduct." At court, where the arch- 
duchess appeared more and more frequently as the time of her 
marriage approached, the impression she made was not less fa- 
vourable. Every one was both surprised and charmed by the 
" expression of kindness, affability, and gayety in her charming 
countenance." 

At an entertainment given to her at Saxeburg, on the Eve of 
Saint Antony, the young princess delighted every one by her 
bearing and conversation. Even Kaunitz, blas^ as he was, was 
astonished. Mercy, who had come to Austria in the beginning 
of 1770, was equally flattered to see that the future dauphiness 
of France listened to him, and profited by his counsel. Little 
by little she was initiated into public life and the art of receiving. 
Twice a week the cavagnole was held in her apartment, and on 
other days a lottery. The princes of the imperial family and 
the ambassadors were admitted ; the entertainment continued 
until ten o'clock. Marie Antoinette, or rather Madame Antoine, 
— it was the name they still gave her, — exerted herself to show 
an interest in each one ; and an eye-witness adds that she suc- 
ceeded. "This noble company gave her the best bearing and 



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lO LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

tone possible; every oae was delighted with her, and the 
empress more than all." 

Everything was preparing for her approaching union, nor were 
the preparations made lightly. The mother and daughter faced 
the ambitious future, which they both desired, with an almost re- 
ligious gravity. It was decided that the archduchess should go 
into retreat for three days during Holy Week under the direction 
of the Abb6 de Vermond. 

Frivolous as she was, the young girl meant to make the retreat 
a serious one ; she even regretted that it was to be so short. •* It 
may take me a longer time to lay all my thoughts before you," 
she remarked to her preceptor. 

Her departure approached. From the ist of July, 1769, the 
Marquis de Durfort had been arranging the details of the mar- 
riage with the Prince von Kaunitz. The plan of the contract 
was submitted to the king on his return from Compi^gne, and on 
the 1 3th of January, 1 770, the last note from the court of Vienna 
was transmitted to Versailles. During the first days of April 
the official congratulations began ; on the 2d, the German and 
Hungarian gardes-nobles were admitted to kiss the hand of the 
archduchess ; on the same day the rector of the University de- 
livered an address to her in Latin, and she replied in the same 
tongue ; on the 3d, it was the turn of the officers of the garrison 
and of the magistrates. 

On the 14th of April the empress announced officially to her 
ministers the marriage of her daughter to the dauphin of France. 
On the i6th, the "Gazette de France" records, "The court be- 
ing in full dress, the ambassador of France had a solemn audience 
with their Royal and Imperial Majesties, when, in the name of 
the king, his master, he demanded Madame the Archduchess 
Antoinette as consort for Monseigneur the Dauphin." 

After this ceremony a drawing-room was held at the palace. 
When the ambassador arrived he was received by the chief 
officers of their Majesties; the palace guards lined the grand 
staircase; the infantry life guards were in the first antechamber; 
the German and Hungarian gardes-nobles formed a double file in 
the other rooms; and the court was both numerous and brilliant. 
The ambassador went first to have audience of the emperor, 
then of the empress-queen, of whom he demanded, in the name 
of his most Christian king, the hand of Madame the Archduchess. 
Her Royal and Imperial Majesty having given her consent, her 



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CELEBRATION OF THE BETROTHAL. II 

Royal Highness was summoned to the audience-chamber, where, 
after having made a profound reverence to the empress and re- 
ceived her permission, she took from the hands of the ambassa- 
dor a letter from Monseigneur the Dauphin and a portrait of that 
prince, which was then hung round her neck by the Countess von 
Trautmansdorff, head-mistress of the household of her Royal 
Highness. Toward half-past eight the court repaired to the the- 
atre, which was magnificently decorated and illuminated. **La 
M^re Confidente," a comedy by Marivaux, was given, and after- 
ward a new ballet composed by Noverre, called " Les Bergers 
de Tempe." 

On the following day, the 17th, pursuant to the custom ob- 
served under such circumstances by the House of Austria, the 
archduchess made, in the presence of the ambassador of France 
and of the emperor, the empress, and the ministers and council- 
lors of state, her renunciation of the hereditary succession, both 
paternal and maternal. The Prince von Kaunitz read the form of 
the renunciation ; Marie Antoinette signed it, and took her oath 
upon the Bible, which the Count von Herberstein, coadjutor of 
the Prince-Bishop von Laybach, held for her. On the same day 
the emperor gave a magnificent entertainment at the Belvedere ; 
a hundred men had worked for more than two months on the 
preparations for it. There was supper for fifteen hundred persons, 
a masked ball, fireworks, — in fact, nothing was lacking that could 
add to the brilliancy of the celebration. 

On the 1 8th it was the French ambassador's turn. The streets 
which led to the Lichtenstein palace, where the embassy had its 
lodging, were brilliantly illuminated ; the avenues, the entrance, 
the interior, were all decorated in exquisite taste, while at the 
foot of the garden rose a beautiful edifice representing the Tem- 
ple of Hymen, from which after nightfall rose sparkling sheaves 
of sky-rockets. 

On the 19th, at six o'clock in the evening, the whole court 
betook itself to the Church of the Augustines through the gallery 
leading from the palace, which was guarded on either side by a 
double file of grenadiers. The empress conducted her daughter, 
who was magnificently attired in a robe of cloth-of-silver, while 
the Countess von Trautmansdorff carried her train. The Arch- 
duke Ferdinand represented the dauphin. When the emperor 
and empress were seated on the dais, the archduke and the 
archduchess knelt at the spot prepared for them. The nuncio of 



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12 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

the Pope, Visconti, blessed the rings, and gave the august couple 
the nuptial benediction. Then he entoned the TV Deuniy which 
was sung by the court musicians to the accompaniment of cannon 
and musketry. The marriage by proxy was accomplished ; the 
archduchess was now dauphiness ; and the Comte de Lorge, son 
of the ambassador, the Marquis de Durfort, immediately set out 
to carry the news to Versailles. 

On the following day the court dined in public; a drawing- 
room was held in the evening, and a medal was struck bear- 
ing Hymen and Concord, weaving myrtle wreaths and bearing 
horns of plenty, with this device : Concordia novo sanguinis nexu 
firmata. 

Yet in the midst of these bewildering ///^j and striking specta- 
cles, I know not what sadness weighed upon all hearts and op- 
pressed all breasts. Was it simple grief at parting, or was it 
that mysterious fear which in solemn hours disturbs even the 
most steadfast souls? However brilliant the destiny of the young 
bride appeared, the future was clouded by uncertainty and Ihe 
present by separation. 

Clear-sighted as she was, and exactly informed by her faithful 
ambassador, Mercy, of all that was taking place at the French 
court, Maria Theresa was not dazzled by the great future opening 
before her daughter. She could not but knx)w how undermined 
and tottering was the throne upon which the archduchess should 
one day sit. A story is told that before the departure of Marie 
Antoinette she was desirous of consulting a celebrated thau- 
maturgus, Dr. Gasser, concerning her future. The doctor re- 
garded the young princess for a long time, hesitated awhile, and 
then said with a serious mien that there were crosses for all 
shoulders. 

Whatever may be the truth of this anecdote, which is perhaps 
only a legend, every one at Vienna grieved over the departure of 
the young princess who had never shown anything but kindness 
and graciousness toward them. Men and women all felt regret. 
The avenues and the streets were filled with a sad-faced crowd. 
*' The capital of Austria presents the appearance of a city of 
mourning," one eye-witness writes. 

On the 2 1st of April, at half-past nine in the morning, the 
new dauphiness took leave of her mother, and set forth from the 
city of Vienna, which she was never to see again, on her way to 
France. The emperor accompanied her as far as Molek: he 



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THE EMPRESS'S COUNSEL TO HER DAUGHTER. 13 

could not bring himself to leave his sister, whom he often scolded, 
but whom he loved none the less. When on the following day 
at noon he re-entered Vienna, he found the city still plunged in 
sadness and Maria Theresa bathed in tears. 

On the day of departure, the 2ist, the empress had roused 
herself for a time from her grief to trace for her daughter a rule 
of conduct in which one knows not whether most to admire the 
wisdom of her policy, the insight of the mother, or the faith of 
the Christian. 

Like the Emperor Francis, she sought to prepare the young 
princess for the obstacles she might find along her path; but 
being addressed to Marie Antoinette alone, her instructions were 
of a more personal and precise character. Like the emperor, 
she also recommended piety above everything as the chief and 
fundamental virtue. She repeated in general its precepts, those 
of a broad and mdulgent piety, which is ever a refuge for those 
who practise it, without being a singularity or a burden to others; 
nor did she forget the duties suited to the exalted position her 
daughter was destined to fill, and certain rules of conduct peculiar 
to the court of France. 

**Do not undertake any recommendations/* she wrote; "listen to no 
one, if you would be at peace. Have no curiosity, — this is a fault which 
I fear greatly for you ; avoid all familiarity with your inferiors. Ask of 
Monsieur and Madame de Noailles, and even exact of them, under all cir- 
cumstances, advice as to what, as a foreigner and being desirous of pleasing 
the nation, you should do, and that they should tell you frankly if there be 
anything in your bearing, discourse, or any point which you should correct 
Reply amiably to every one, and with grace and dignity ; you can if you will. 
You must learn to refuse. . . . After Strasburg you must accept nothing 
without taking counsel of Monsieur and Madame de Noailles ; and you 
should refer to them every one who would speak to you of his personal 
affairs, saying frankly that being a stranger yourself, you cannot undertake 
to recommend any one to the king. If you wish you may add, in order to 
make your reply more emphatic, ' The empress, my mother, has expressly 
forbidden me to undertake any recommendations.' Do not be ashamed 
to ask advice of any one, and do nothing on your own responsibility." 

Fifteen days later, on May 4, the cortige being then not far 
from France, the empress, who could not console herself for her 
daughter's departure, save in thinking of her and following her 
in every stage of her journey, wrote to her again to add fresh 
counsel for the conduct of her life. 



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14 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

" You will find a tender father who will also be your friend if you de- 
serve it," she said. " Put entire confidence in him ; you will run no risk. 
Love him, obey him, seek to divine his thoughts ; you cannot do enough 
at this moment, when I am losing you. . . . Concerning the dauphin, I 
shall say nothing ; you know my delicacy on this point A wife should be 
submissive in everything to her husband, and should have no thought but 
to please him and to do his will. . . • The only true happiness in this 
worid lies in a happy marriage ; I know whereof I speak. Everything 
depends on the wife if she be yielding, sweet, and amusing. 

" I counsel you, my dear daughter, to re-read my paper on the 21st of 
every month. I beg you to be true to me on this point. My only fear 
for you is negligence in your prayers and studies ; and lukewarmness suc- 
ceeds negligence. Fight against it, for it is more dangerous than a more 
reprehensible, even wicked, state; one can conquer that more easily. 
Love your family ; be affectionate to them, — to your aunts as well as to 
your brothers-in-law and sisters-in-law. Suffer no evil-speaking ; you must 
either silence the persons, or escape it by withdrawing from them. If you 
value your peace of mind, you must from the start avoid this pitfall, which 
I greatly fear for you, knowing your curiosity." 

In the mean while the dauphiness was traversing Germany. 
On the 2Sth she arrived at Munich ; on the 29th at Augsburg; 
on the 30th at Gunzburg. All along her route the people assem- 
bled in crowds, anxious to see an archduchess of Austria and 
dauphiness of France; they returned charmed by her conde- 
scension, her beauty, her amiability, and her air of sweetness. 
During her journey the ladies who accompanied her sought to 
divert her. One of them having been indiscreet enough to say to 
her, *' Are you very anxious to see Monseigneur the Dauphin?" 
the young princess replied in a tone of dignity, " Madame, I 
shall be at Versailles in five days ; on the sixth I can more easily 
answer your question." Having administered this reproof, she 
resumed her air of gayety and amiability, but her thoughts turned 
obstinately toward her native country and those she was leaving 
behind. When they crossed the boundaries of the provinces 
under the dominion of the empress, she burst into tears. 
" Alas ! " she cried, " I shall never see her again ! " 

It was the last cry of her heart, her farewell to all the associa- 
tions of childhood, to all her family ties, to all that she had loved 
in her German fatherland. From the moment she set foot on 
France she felt herself a Frenchwoman. 



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CHAPTER II. 

The Dauphiness of France. — Strasburg. — Nancy. — Rheims. — 
CoMPifeGNE. — Portrait of the Dauphiness. — Marie Antoinette. 
AT St. Denys. — Supper at La Muette with Madame du 
Barry. — Celebration of the Marriage at Versailles — 
The Pretensions of the Princesses of the House of Lor- 
raine. — Celebrations in Paris. — The Catastrophe on La 
Place Louis XV. — Letter from the Dauphin to the Lieu- 
tenant OF THE Police. 

ON the 3d of May, the Comte de Noailles, ambassador 
extraordinary to meet the dauphiness, entered Strasburg. 
It was in that city, won for France by Louis XIV., that he was 
to greet in the name of France the wife of the great-grandson of 
Louis XIV. On the Sth of May the Comtesse de Noailles, lady- 
in-waiting, the Comte de Tess6, chief equerry, the Comte de Saulx, 
gentleman-in-waiting, arrived in their turn with the household of 
the dauphiness. Finally on the 7th, toward noon, Marie An- 
toinette herself appeared on the banks of the Rhine. 

On an island in the middle of the river a pavilion had been 
erected, destined for the ceremony of the delivery^ as it was 
called; that is, the moment when the young princess should 
pass from the hands of her German household into those of her 
French household. By a strange want of thought the tapestries 
chosen from the collection belonging to the crown to decorate 
the great hall which for the first time should shelter beneath a 
French roof the young wife on her way to join her husband, 
represented the unhappy loves and bloody quarrels of Jason and 
Medea; in other words, a " picture of the most unfortunate union 
that ever took place." Strange pictures, and a strange welcome I 
Goethe, who was then a student at Strasburg, was struck on 
seeing these tapestries as with a gloomy presage, and it is said 
that the archduchess on perceiving them could not restrain an 
expression of fear. "Ah," she cried, " what an omen I " 



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I6 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

The pavilion of the Rhine was divided into three rooms : in 
the middle a vast salon, where the delivery was to take place ; 
to the right and left two apartments, one occupied by the French 
household, the other by the German. It was in the latter that 
the dauphiness had to undergo the trying ceremony of the 
toilette. Etiquette demanded that she should discard everything 
that could remind her of her native country, even to her stockings 
and underlinen. When she had submitted to this vexatious oper- 
ation, and was re-dressed in the costume sent from Paris, " she 
looked a thousand times more charming in the French fashion 
than she did before," an eye-witness wrote. The doors were 
opened; the dauphiness passed into the central salon, where 
she was received by the Comte de Noailles, Bouret, secretary of 
the king's cabinet, and Gerard, first secretary of foreign affairs. 
When full powers had been exchanged, and the documents of 
delivery and reception had been signed by the respective com- 
missioners, the room where the French household was waiting 
was opened. The dauphiness, lithe and graceful, advanced 
toward the Comtesse de N.oailles, threw herself into her arms, 
and begged her to be her guide, her support, her consolation. 
At that moment the ladies of the German household approached 
their young mistress to kiss her hand for a last time, and then 
retired ; she pressed them to her heart, weeping, and charged 
them with many tender messages for her mother, her sisters, her 
friends at Vienna ; then turning toward her French ladies, she 
said, smiling through her tears, " Pardon me, these are for the 
family and the fatherland I am leaving; for the future I shall not 
forget that I am French." 

The city of Strasburg was in gala array. It had prepared for 
the dauphiness the splendours it had displayed twenty-five years 
before for the journey of Louis the Well-beloved. Twelve years 
later Marie Antoinette still preserved a grateful memory of it. 
It was there, she said, that she had received the first homage of 
the French, and had realized the happiness of becoming their 
queen. Three companies of young children of from twelve to 
fifteen years of age, habited as CenUSuisses, formed the line along 
the passage of the princess. Twenty-four young girls of the most 
distinguished families of Strasburg, dressed in the national cos- 
tume, strewed flowers before her; and eighteen shepherds and 
shepherdesses presented her with baskets of flowers. When she 
set foot on the territory of the city Monsieur d'Antigny, the chief 



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STRASBURG. \^ 



' magistrate, addressed her in German. " Do not speak German, 
Monsieur," she said ; " from to-day I understand no other lan- 
guage but French." 

When she entered the city in the coach of the king a triple 
discharge of artillery greeted her, all the bells rang out, and the 
Mar^chal de Contades received her under a magnificent trium- 
phal arch. On the square in front of the city hall fountains of 
wine ran for the people, whole beeves were roasted, and the dis- 
tribution of bread was so abundant that no one took the trouble 
to pick up the pieces. 

The dauphiness traversed the city between a double file of 
soldiers, and descended at the episcopal palace, where the Car- 
dinal de Rohan, bishop of Strasburg, presented the chapter to her. 
In the evening there was a grand banquet, presentation of the 
ladies of the nobility, plays given by the various guilds, a dance 
executed by the coopers, and a spectacle at the Com^die Fran- 
^aise. When night fell the entire city seemed to be on fire : the 
houses and public edifices were illuminated ; lines of fire outlined 
the cathedral from top to bottom, throwing into luminous relief 
the graceful details of Erwin von Steinbach's masterpiece. Oppo- 
site the bishop's palace, on the other side of the river, was a vast 
colonnade, under the arches of which gardens were seen stretch- 
ing away into the distance ; an artificial parterre carried on boats 
floated on the river adjoining the gardens, and the trees twinkled 
with coloured globes. At the same time a magnificent display of 
fireworks on the island, representing hundreds of mythological 
figures, coats-of-arms, chariots, marine gods, the intertwined 
monogram of the dauphin and dauphiness, transformed the river 
into a sheet of fire. 

On the following day, the 8th, Marie Antoinette visited the 
cathedral. By a strange coincidence the prelate who awaited her 
with the chapter at the entrance to felicitate her, and who greeted 
in her " the soul of Maria Theresa about to unite itself to the 
soul of the Bourbons," was the nephew of the bishop, that prince, 
Louis de Rohan, who was later to inflict upon the dauphiness, 
become queen, the deadliest of injuries. But in the midst of the 
then so brilliant prospect who could discern these shadows? 

From Strasburg the dauphiness went to Saverne, where she 
was lodged in the chateau of the bishops. The Cardinal de Rohan 
presented to her a woman who was a hundred years old, and who 
had never been ill. " Princess," the woman said to her in Ger- 

VOL. I.— 2 ^ , 

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l8 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

man, " I pray to Heaven that you may live to be as old as I, and 
as free from infirmities." ** I hope I may," replied the dauphiness, 
" if it be for the good of France." After giving her her hand to 
kiss, she ordered a sum of money to be given to her. 

In the evening there was a ball ; after the ball fireworks; after 
the fireworks a supper, at which for the last time the ladies of the 
German household of Marie Antoinette met together with the 
ladies of the French household. On the 9th they definitely took 
leave of the archduchess, the Prince von Stahremberg alone re- 
maining to accompany her. 

The dauphiness left Alsace delighted with the welcome which 
she had there received. The peasants collected from all parts 
along her route ; the roads were strewn with flowers ; young girls 
in their best frocks brought her bouquets. The population of the 
country, ever eager for a spectacle, and then so ardent in their 
love for their princes, pressed close to the carriage, and per- 
ceiving through the window the fresh and gracious countenance 
of the young woman, they cried, " How pretty our dauphiness 
is ! " A lady of her suite who overheard this repeated it to the 
princess. " Madame," replied Marie Antoinette, " the French 
look upon me with indulgent eyes/' 

On the evening of the 9th the dauphiness arrived at Nancy, 
illuminated as Strasburg had been. Nancy was the cradle of the 
House of Lorraine, the birthplace of the Emperor Francis; it 
was the last bond of union between the family of her origin and 
the family of her adoption, — between Austria and France. On 
the following day, after the official ceremonies, she betook herself 
to the convent of the Cordeliers to kneel at the tomb of her fore- 
fathers. The grave idea of death mingled with the excitement of 
the celebrations. 

That evening Marie Antoinette slept at Bar; at Luneville the 
gendarmerie, on the order of the Marquis de Castries and the Mar- 
quis d'Autichamp, accorded her military honours. At Commercy 
the archduchess received a token of homage that went more 
directly to her heart: a fair-haired child of ten offered her a 
bouquet, and greeted her as " the descendant of a family who 
for almost a thousand years had reigned over the hearts of the 
people of Lorraine." 

A few miles from Chdlons an old country cur6, surrounded 
by his parishioners, approached the dauphiness's coach to pay 
his respects. He had taken as the text for his discourse the 



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RHEIMS. 19 



words from the Canticle of Canticles : " Pulchra es et formosa.** 
But at the sight of the princess respect, emotion, and surprise so 
disturbed him that he could not proceed farther than his text. 
He racked his brains in vain ; his memory obstinately deserted 
him. Marie Antoinette, perceiving this, and in order to put an 
end to the embarrassment of the good man, took from his hand, 
with a charming smile of thanks, the bouquet which he had 
for her. "Ah, Madame," cried the good cur6, recovering, if 
not his discourse, at least his presence of mind, " do not be as- 
tonished at my lack of memory ; at sight of you Solomon would 
have forgotten his address, and would. never more have thought 
of the beautiful Egyptian ! *' 

On the nth the dauphiness descended at the H6tel de Tlnten- 
dance at Chdlons. Six young girls, dowered by the city on the 
occasion of her marriage, recited these lines to her: — 

** Princess, who with wit, loveliness, and grace 
Comes to add lustre to our race, 
On this day memorable what happiness we Ve won I 
'T is to thy splendid nuptials that we owe our own. 
From this proud alliance two benefits shall spring 
To tune the State in greater consonance : 
We shall give subjects liege to France, 
While you shall give to her her king." 

In the evening there was a representation, when " La Partie de 
Chasse de Henri IV." was played, a supper in public, an illumi- 
nation which represented the temple of Hymen, the inauguration 
of a new gate to the city, of which the dauphiness accepted the 
dedication, distribution of bread, wine, and meat, and repeated 
exclamations of "Long live the King! Long live Madame the 
Dauphiness ! " 

On the 1 2th Marie Antoinette passed through Rheims, the 
coronation city. ** This is the city of France," she said tactfully, 
" which I hope to revisit at the latest possible date." 

That evening she arrived at Soissons, surrounded by a body- 
guard which had accompanied her from Fismes. The citizens 
and the arquebusiers met her at the gates of the city. The 
streets which led to the bishop's palace, where the princess was 
to lodge, were decorated in a singular and picturesque fashion. 
There was a double row of fruit-trees, twenty-five feet high, be- 
tween which hung garlands of ivy, flowers, gold and silver 
gauze, interspersed with lanterns. The dauphiness was received 



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20 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

at the steps of the palace by the bishop-duke of Soissons, and 
conducted to her apartment through a gallery lighted by a thou- 
sand candles. Distributions were made to the people, and in the 
evening a wonderful display of fireworks showed to the enthusias- 
tic crowd a temple surmounted by two groups : Fame announcing 
the dauphiness of France, and a genius presenting to Fame her 
portrait. 

On the following day, faithful to the teachings of her mother, 
Marie Antoinette received the communion from the hands of the 
bishop in the palace chapel, and in the evening assisted at a sol- 
emn TV Deum in the cathedral. In the afternoon of the 14th she 
set out on the road to Compi^gne. 

In one of the towns through which she passed, some professors 
and students paid their respects to her in Latin, and she was 
sufficiently learned to reply to the young Ciceros in the same 
tongue. 

The whole journey from Strasburg to Compi^gne had been 
one long and brilliant triumph for the princess. Everywhere 
along her route the people in gala attire had crowded; every- 
where she had bewitched them by the condescension of her bear- 
ing, the freshness of her smile, the kindliness of her greeting, the 
propriety of her remarks, — by " her gentle gayety and dignified 
affability," the " Gazette " said. " A touching spectacle," added 
the editor, ** for a nation whose chief sentiment is a love of their 
rulers." Every one who saw the dauphiness went away delighted ; 
every one who heard her was in raptures. " Our archduchess- 
dauphiness has surpassed all my hopes," Mercy wrote. 

The entire royal family was assembled at Compi^gne. The 
king had already sent the Marquis de Chauvelin to Chalons, the 
Due d'Aumont to Soissons, the Due de Choiseul some leagues 
from Compi^gne, to meet the dauphiness. He himself left Ver- 
sailles on the 13th with the dauphin and Mesdames, slept at 
Muette. and arrived at Compi^gne on the 14th, there to await the 
wife of his grandson. The meeting took place at the Pont de 
Berne, in the middle of the forest. As soon as the young prin- 
cess perceived the king, she jumped from her carriage, and ran and 
threw herself at his feet. Enchanted by her impulsive abandon, 
Louis XV. raised her, embraced her with great tenderness, and 
presented her to the dauphin, who according to etiquette kissed 
her upon the cheek. They returned to the chateau, the king on 
the back seat of the carriage with the dauphiness by his side, the 



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PORTRAIT OF THE DAUPHINESS. 21 

dauphin on the front seat with the Comtesse de Noailles. The 
king and the dauphin themselves conducted the dauphiness to her 
apartment, and there presented to her in turn the members of 
the royal family, — the Due d'Orl^ans, the Due and Duchesse de 
^Chartres, the Prince de Cond^, the Due and Duchesse de Bour- 
bon, the Prince de Conti, the Comte and Comtesse de la Marche, 
the Due de Penthi^vre, the Princesse de Lamballe. The king 
was delighted with this first interview; he found the dauphiness 
charming. 

She was indeed charming ; and the descriptions which the au- 
thors of that period have left readily explain the impression pro- 
duced by so young and fresh an apparition on that aged monarch, 
who was not accustomed to find so much grace and so much 
modesty combined. 

" The dauphiness," writes one chronicler, ** was very well made 
and well proportioned in all her limbs." Her figure, which was 
slender and tall, had at the same time all the suppleness of the 
young girl and the dignity of the woman. Her features perhaps 
were not mathematically regular ; they were pretty rather than 
beautiful : the oval of her face was somewhat too long, and her 
lips, particularly the under one, had the thickness characteristic 
of the Austrian lip. But her mouth was small and well arched ; 
her arms superb ; her hands perfectly formed ; her feet charming ; 
her nose aquiline, delicate, and pretty. Her hair, of a pale blond 
colour of a peculiar shade, crowned a forehead of marvellous 
purity. Her eyes, which were blue without being pale, sweet 
but not languishing, sparkled with vivacity and intelligence, and 
lighted up with a bewitching smile. Her complexion was of daz- 
zling brilliancy, incomparably white, and relieved by a colour 
which had no need of rouge ; her skin was of such transparency 
that it took no shadow, and was the despair of painters. " She was 
not beautiful," one of her contemporaries has said of her; "she 
was better than beautiful." Her walk exhibited at the same time 
the imposing air of the princesses of her family and all the French 
grace. All her motions were marked by suppleness and elegance : 
she did not walk ; she glided. When she traversed the galleries 
of the chateau, her head, which she had a peculiar and alto- 
gether charming fashion of carrying bowed and then raising more 
haughtily when she thought herself alone, — her head, carried on 
her beautiful Greek neck, gave her so much majesty that it seemed 
as tliough one saw a goddess in the midst of her nymphs. " If one 



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22 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

should see her in the most humble garb," a traveller wrote who 
saw her for a moment during her journey, ** it would be easy to 
divine that she had been born upon the throne ; " and a celebrated 
Englishman, Horace Walpole, cried on perceiving her, " She is 
grace personified 1 " 

A painter, having*her portrait to paint, thought he could not 
do better than to place it in the centre of an open rose ; and a 
poet added, — 

" 'T is the branch cf a rose 
Come to join our fair lily." 

On the evening of her arrival at Compi^gne the ladies who pre- 
sided at her undress having said to her, ** Madame, you delight 
every one," she replied : " They view me with too great partiality ; 
my heart is contracting debts which it can never repay. I trust 
every one will credit me with the wish I have of doing so." 

On the isth of May the court left Compi^gne. The cortege 
halted at St. Denys. Marie Antoinette went to see the daughter 
of Louis XV., Madame Louise, who had entered the Carmelites 
a little while before. She remained half an hour, and charmed 
every one. " Here is, my dear mother," a nun of St. Denys 
wrote to a Carmelite of the Rue St. Jaques, — "here is a 
perfect princess in face, figure, and manner, and what is more 
precious, they say that she is delightfully pious ! Her physiog- 
nomy exhibits an expression of majesty, modesty, and sweet- 
ness. The king, Mesdames, and, above all, Monseigneur the 
Dauphin, seemed enchanted with her, and vied with one another 
in repeating, * She is incomparable ! * " 

All along the route of the procession the spectators were not 
less enraptured. The rumour of the passage of the dauphiness 
had spread ; the inhabitants of Paris had congregated en masse 
between Versailles and the Porte Maillot ; the carriages formed a 
double line ; the people applauded ; the crowd was so compact 
that the royal equipage had to proceed at a .walk. When the 
attention of the princess was called to this great affluence, she, 
with her perfect amiability and fine tact, feigned to believe that 
all this homage was intended for the old monarch. " The French 
can never see enough of their king," she said ; " they cannot treat 
me with more kindness than in proving to me that they know how 
to love one whom I am already accustomed to regard as a second 
father." 

At seven o'clock in the evening Marie Antoinette arrived at 



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CELEBRATION AT VERSAILLES. 23 

La Muette. There the king awaited her, and with him the Comte 
de Provence, the Comte d'Artois, Madame Clotilde, and also, 
alas 1 that miserable woman at whose feet Louis XV. dishonoured 
the most beautiful crown in existence, and who had elicited from 
his culpable condescension permission to sup with the dauphiness. 
The young princess was profoundly hurt: her proud purity re- 
volted against the impure contact which the despotic weakness 
of the old king imposed upon her; but she had sufficient self- 
control to give no outward sign of her secret displeasure. After 
supper one of the courtiers who lay in wait for her inexperience 
asked her how she had found the Comtesse du Barry. She dis- 
cerned the trap, and answered simply, " Charming." 

Was it to forestall or to weaken the bad impression produced 
by this strange society that Louis XV. carried to his granddaugh- 
ter at La Muette a magnificent set of diamonds, and on the day 
following the marriage sent to her a chest exquisitely carved by 
Bocciardi, full of ornaments? He ever overwhelmed her with 
presents. He gave her all the diamonds and pearls of the late 
dauphiness, and he added the collar of pearls formerly worn 
by Anne of Austria, and entailed by her on the queens and 
dauphinesses of France; the smallest of these pearls was as 
large as a nut. 

On Wednesday, the 1 6th of May, at nine o'clock, Marie An- 
toinette left La Muette for Versailles, where her toilette was to take 
place. The king and the dauphin had preceded her the evening 
before. When she arrived at the chateau, the king received her 
on the ground-floor, discoursed for some time with her, and 
presented to her Madame Elisabeth, the Comtesse de Clermont, 
and the Princesse de Conti. At one o'clock she went to the apart- 
ment of the king, whence the cortege started for the chapel. 

The dauphin and the dauphiness, followed by the old monarch, 
advanced toward the altar and knelt on a cushion placed on the 
steps of the sanctuary. The archbishop of Rheims, Monseigneur 
de la Roche- Aymon, grand almoner, offered them the holy water, 
then after having exhorted the young couple, blessed the thirteen 
pieces of gold and the ring. The dauphin took the ring and 
placed it on the fourth finger of the dauphiness, and gave her 
the gold-pieces. The archbishop pronounced the nuptial bene- 
diction, and as soon as the king had returned to his prie-DieUy 
opened the mass. The royal choir sang a motet by the Abb6 
de Ganzargue; after the offertory the dauphin and dauphiness 



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24 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

went to make their offering. At the Pater a canopy of silver bro- 
cade was spread above their heads, — the bishop of Senlis, Mon- 
seigneur de Roquelaure, grand almoner to the king, holding it on 
the side of the dauphin, and the bishop of Chartres, grand almoner 
to the dauphiness, holding it on the side of that princess. 

At the end of the mass the grand almoner approached the prie- 
Dieu of the king and presented to him the marriage register of 
the royal parish, which the cure had carried. Then the cortege 
• returned to the king's apartment in the same order, and the 
dauphiness, after going to her own apartment, received the 
officers of her household and the foreign ambassadors. 

An immense crowd filled the royal city. Paris was deserted : 
the shops were closed ; the entire population had betaken itself 
to Versailles to assist at the celebrations and fireworks which 
were to finish the day. 

But at three o'clock the sky became overcast ; a violent storm 
burst; the fireworks could not be set off; the illuminations were 
drowned by the rain ; and the crowd of curious people who filled 
the gardens and streets were obliged to flee in disorder before the 
peals of thunder and torrents of rain. 

In the chateau, however, the day ended brilliantly. The court- 
iers, in sumptuous attire, eager to see and above all to be seen, 
crowded the apartments ; a magnificent supper was served in the 
theatre, transformed into a banqueting-hall and lighted by " a 
prodigious number of candles." ** All the ladies in full dress in 
the front of the boxes presented a sight as surprising as it was 
magnificent." The court had never seemed so brilliant. 

At six o'clock a drawing-room was held, games of lansquenet, 
and a state dinner. In the evening the king conducted the newly 
married couple to their room. The archbishop of Rheims blessed 
the bed. The king gave the chemise to the dauphin, the Duchesse 
de Chartres to the dauphiness. But despite the splendour of the 
celebrations and the promising aspect of the future at that mo- 
ment, certain obstinate pessimists could not help regarding the 
rumbling of the storm as a menace from Heaven ; and the super- 
stitious recalled that the young wife, in signing the marriage regis- 
ter, had let fall a blot of ink which had effaced half her name. 

On the following day began at Versailles a long series of splen- 
did entertainments, — drawing-rooms, balls given in the new the- 
atre, built by the architect Gabriel ; a representation of the opera 
of " Pers^e," of which certain details greatly amused the dauphin- 



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PRETENSIONS OF PRINCESSES OF LORRAINE. 2$ 

ess ; fireworks ; playing of the fountains ; illuminations of the 
grand canal, of the terrace and gardens. 

But with these entertainments also began the storms at court, 
not less violent and more treacherous than the storms of Heaven. 
At a ball on the 19th the minuet danced by Mademoiselle de Lor- 
raine " caused much discontent." The ambassador from Austria, 
the Comte de Mercy, had asked the king on the occasion of the 
marriage of the dauphiness to show some particular mark of dis- 
tinction to Mademoiselle Lorraine, daughter of the Comtesse de 
Brionne, and a relative of the emperor. Louis XV., desirous of 
manifesting " his gratitude to the empress for the present she 
had sent him," decided that Mademoiselle Lorraine should dance 
the minuet immediately after the princes and princesses of the 
blood. " The choice of the dancers depending solely on the will 
of the king, without regard to ofiice, rank, or dignity," this honour 
accorded the daughter of the Comtesse de Brionne did not entail 
any consequences, nor give any pledge for the future. None the 
less it offended all the nobility. All the noblemen of the court, 
even the humblest, assembled at the house of the bishop of Noyon, 
second ecclesiastical peer, in the absence on business of the first 
peer, the archbishop of Rheims, and drew up a long memoir pro- 
testing that there could be no intermediate rank between the 
princes of the blood and the AauU noblesse. The public was very 
much amused at this quarrel, and by the fact that the courtiers 
should assemble under the leadership of a bishop to deliberate 
gravely on the serious question of a minuet. Some one paro- 
died the memoir of the noblesse in these witty verses, which ran 
over Paris : — 

" Sire, the nobles of your State 
Will see with greatest pain 
A princess of Lorraine 
Precedence o*er them arrogate. 
If your Majesty hath planned 
Thus to slight a faithful band, 
We shall quit our lady's tresses, 
Shall desert the violin. 
Consider well : our seal we Ve set 
Signed : Bishop of Noyon, 
La Vaupali^re, Baufifremont, 
Germont, Laval, and De Villette.** 

Louis XV. persisted. On the day of the ball the ladies who 
had been named for the dance made a point of traversing the 



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26 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

apartments of Versailles in undress ; in the evening at five o'clock, 
the hour appointed, only three ladies were in the salon. It took 
a formal command from the king to force the others to appear. 
The entertainment was carried out in the manner determined upon, 
but not without a profound discontent; and of all the magnificence 
displayed at Versailles to celebrate the marriage of the dauphiness 
there remained but wounded vanity and a witticism : ** How do 
you find my entertainments?" Louis XV. asked of the Abb^ 
Terray. " Ah, Sire, no money can pay for them ! " answered the 
comptroller-general. 

But what were these court intrigues beside the catastrophe 
which two weeks later was to plunge the capital into mourning? 

On the 30th of May the city of Paris in its turn celebrated by 
public rejoicings the marriage of the dauphiness. The celebra- 
tion was to be crowned by fireworks on the Place Louis XV. 
facing the entrance of the Rue Royale, and by an illumination 
of the colonnades round the square. The preparations promised 
well. The principal decoration, in front of the statue of Louis 
XV., represented the temple of Hymen; at the four corners 
four dolphins were to pour forth fountains of fire, and at the four 
facades four streams were to fall in cascades of flame. A building 
placed behind the statue held the reserve of fireworks. 

Unfortunately, in consequence of a conflict of jurisdiction, the 
superintendence of the celebration was not intrusted to the lieu- 
tenant of the police, Sartines, but to the provost of the mer- 
chants, Bignon. Owing to lack of experience or capacity, Bignon 
neglected to take the necessary precautions. The display of 
fireworks, instead of facing toward the Place Louis XV., which 
could have held a large number of spectators, was turned toward 
the Rue Royale, then in process of construction, where the heaps 
of materials and the ditches excavated for the sewerage obstructed 
the traffic. No rules had been published for the circulation of 
the carriages ; and finally, the garden of the Tuileries, through 
which the crowd might have passed, had been closed at the 
usual hour. 

The fireworks would not go off"; was it a presage? A fuse, care- 
lessly applied, ignited the bouquet before the time ; the principal 
pieces failed. When all was finished, the people, who filled the 
Place Louis XV. and the Rue Royale, began to move: Two 
streams were formed, — one seeking to gain the square to see the 
illumination of the colonnades, and to partake of the fountains of 



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CATASTROPHE ON LA PLACE LOUIS XV. 2/ 

wine which had been running since seven o'clock; the other 
forcing its way through the Rue Royale to visit the fair, which 
was held along the boulevards. These two currents, advancing 
in opposite directions, blocked each other, and neither wished to 
give way. The crowds pressing from behind pushed and smoth- 
ered those who were in front ; the confusion was indescribable. 

The police were not there. The gardes de villcy insufficient in 
number, made vain efforts to establish order; but what could a 
handful of men do against that compact mass of people, who 
pressed forward and would listen to nothing? The cries of some 
persons, who were being crushed or robbed by the scamps who 
swarmed in the crowd, augmented the tumult. To crown the 
evil, the reserve of fireworks and the scaffolding round the statue 
of the king caught fire. The firemen, with their big horses and 
heavy machines, hurried to the scene of the conflagration, forcing 
aside with violence the people massed in the Rue Royale, which 
was like a funnel already obstructed ; carriages in search of their 
masters sought to pass in the wake made by the engines. Some 
spectators, half crushed, took sword in hand to liberate them- 
selves; some pickpockets threw themselves into the squabble 
to take advantage of it, and increased the panic. The cries of 
women and children, who were being suffocated, the noise of 
horses, the oaths of the coachmen, the red light of the conflagra- 
tion, — all contributed to spread terror through the crowd, who 
felt themselves perishing without being able to do anything to save 
themselves. Woe to him who fell ! he was immediately trampled 
to death. The crowd, mad with fear and unable to resist the 
pressure from behind, sought to throw itself to one side; the 
people fell into the ditches which the authorities had neglected to 
cover over. The crowd precipitated itself into these yawning 
sepulchres, — each human wave swallowing up the one that had 
preceded it, and being swallowed up in its turn, amid the shrieks 
of the dying and the cries of the wounded. It was a horrible 
sight. 

When a reinforcement of the guard, called at the last moment, 
finally succeeded in establishing order, it was too late. They re- 
moved one hundred and thirty- two corpses and five or six times 
as many wounded, and among them personages of distinction and 
foreign ministers. These corpses, ranged along the boulevard 
like a gloomy decoration, were buried on the following day in 
the cemetery of the Madeleine. Who could then have foretold 



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28 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

that they went there to await the princess whose marriage had 
been the occasion of their death? 

The dauphiness was on her way from Versailles with Mesdames 
to view the illumination of the square, when she heard of the 
accident that had just happened. She turned back, her heart 
bursting, her eyes wet. Despite the care that was taken to con- 
ceal from her the extent of the catastrophe, she could not restrain 
her tears. " You do not tell me all 1 " she kept repeating. "How 
many victims ! *' And when to lessen her regrets, they told her 
that among the corpses many thieves had been taken whose 
pockets were full of stolen valuables, ** Yes," she answered ; " but 
they perished by the side of honest men." 

She sent her purse immediately to Monsieur de Sartines to sue* 
cour the families of the victims ; the dauphin also sent his. He 
awaited, with an impatience which was not habitual to him, the 
moment when his month's allowance should be paid him; as 
soon as he received it, he hastened to forward the six thousand 
livres which was the amount of it to the lieutenant of the police, 
with the following note : — 

I have learned of the accident which happened in Paris, and for which 
I am responsible ; I am deeply distressed. They have brought me what 
the king allows me every month for pocket-money ; I can dispose of only 
that, and I send it to you. Succour the most unfortunate. 

I have great esteem, Monsieur, for you, 

Louis Auguste. 



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CHAPTER III. 

The Royal Family in 1770. — The King. — Mesdames. — The Comte 
DE Provence. — The Comte d*Artois. — Mesdames Clotilde and 
Elisabeth. — The Dauphin. 

WHAT, then, was this royal family like, — the highest in 
the world at the time that Marie Antoinette entered 
it under auspices so brilliant and yet so gloomy? 

The head of the family — the king, Louis XV. — was better 
than his reputation, and, above all, better than his conduct. His 
secret correspondence, now made public, shows that he was at 
bottom more anxious for the honour and glory of France than 
he appeared. At one time he even had the desire to govern it 
himself; but this noble and fleeting aspiration was soon stifled 
by the indolence of his mind, his distrust of himself, his taste for 
frivolity, and the domination of his mistresses. 

Of a contradictory character, he possessed at the same time 
noble qualities and vulgar instincts, generous aspirations and 
selfish desires. In his youth he had shown great promise, — a 
quick intelligence, an attentive mind, an extraordinary memory, 
precocious reason, a keen and true discernment, a heart easy to 
move. The bad instruction of Villery, instead of developing these 
precious germs, destroyed them ; from a gentle and good child, 
he became a self-willed, timid, and awkward one, and soon a 
youth deceitful and uninterested. Ennuis that was the canker 
which during fifty years devoured the heart of Louis XV. ; it was 
often also the reason of his excess. He might have escaped 
from it through a noble passion for public affairs ; the Cardinal 
de Fleury would not permit it. The old minister, in order the 
better to strengthen his own power, cultivated in his royal pupil a 
taste for frivolous things and for futile distractions. He made of 
him what he remained all his life, — " an infant from his head to 
his heels, always ten years behind his age," according to the say- 
ing of the regent. Thenceforward the young prince no longer 



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30 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

belonged to himself, but to him, or rather to her, who could best 
amuse him. 

Louis XV. had inherited from his family great physical beauty, 
in which the majesty of his grandfather, Louis XIV., was subdued 
by the grace of his mother, the charming and lively Duchesse de 
Bourgogne. Despite this beauty, despite a dangerous precocity 
and the temptations of the ladies of the court, whose easy virtue 
would willingly have succumbed to so brilliant and profitable a 
fall, he remained chaste up to the age of twenty. As compensa- 
tion for the lack of stronger qualities and discipline, his preceptor 
had at least inculcated religious principles which for a time held 
the ardour of his senses in check. Unfortunately his temptations 
were more lasting than his firmness ; and the first step once made 
along the path of culpable pleasures, Louis XV., despite certain 
feeble desires to return, could not stop himself. From Madame 
de Mailly he passed to Madame de Vintimille, from Madame de 
Vintimille to the Duchesse de Chdteauroux, from the Duchesse 
de Chdteauroux to Madame de Pompadour and to the fugitive 
beauties of the Parc-aux-Cerfs. After the death of the dauphin 
and dauphiness, struck by this double blow from Heaven, he wished 
to retire within himself and break the chains that so shamefully 
bound him. Later he even contemplated a second marriage with 
the Princesse de Lamballe, it was said, then with one of the daugh- 
ters of Maria Theresa, the Archduchess Elisabeth. An odious 
court intrigue dissipated these good intentions, and threw the old 
king, half repentant, into the arms of a courtesan of low birth, — 
" the vile remnant of public license," as the Abb6 de Beauvais dared 
to say from the pulpit of Versailles. Whatever the weak monarch 
still possessed of virility perished in that shameful bond. The bril- 
liant conqueror of Fontenay became but the humble slave of the 
Du Barry, enduring without a murmur her gross pleasantries and 
her grotesque nicknames, lending himself to her most ridiculous 
caprices, and but too happy to satisfy her luxurious fancies. The 
prince in whom D'Argenson had hailed a veritable talent for gov- 
ernment, humanity, justice, good sense, an interest in affairs, a 
taste for economy, had grown to be an old man, sated, nonchalant, 
hating all work and all constraint, a good-for-nothing king in the 
literal sense of the term,-pllmding his life between the hunt and 
small suppers in the petites maisonSy with no taste for aught but 
the petits cancans of the court, rude anecdotes, and low conver- 
sation ; lavishing money recklessly on his mistress, with no con- 



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MESDAMES. 3 1 



cern for the future of his kingdom nor the complaints of his 
subjects ; clever enough to perceive the abuses ; too indifferent to 
seek to remedy them, remarking cynically to one of his courtiers, 
" Things as they are will last my time." 

And as a just reward, in proportion as the king withdrew from 
his subjects, his people withdrew from him; and the acclama- 
tions which had greeted his youth were changed to murmurs and 
" fanatical discontent." France, who, as Michelet said, had loved 
the child with the devotion of mother, mistress, and nurse, had no 
longer any feeling for him but that of anger and dissatisfaction, — 
anger and dissatisfaction the more intense because her hopes had 
been great and her tenderness long-suffering. Louis XV. the 
Well-beloved had become Louis XV. the Well-hated. 

With the king lived his daughters, Madame Addarde, Madame 
Victoire, Madame Sophie, truly pious princesses, but of a narrow- 
minded piety that knew not how to make itself lovely. Their 
exterior was without grace. Walpole, who saw them on his pres- 
entation at the court of France, describes them as ** clumsy, 
plump old wenches, awkward in their bearing, confused in their 
manner, not knowing what to do or say." As they held them- 
selves very much aloof, being embarrassed whenever it was 
necessary to appear in public, and timid even with their father, 
notwithstanding the fact that he treated them familiarly, neglect- 
ing the court and neglected by it, they never knew how to ac- 
quire the influence which their birth, it would seem, should 
have assured to them, and which Louis XV. on their return 
from Fontrcvault, where they received their education, for the 
most part sufficiently neglected, seemed inclined to let them 
have. After the advent of the Du Barry they lived more retired 
than ever, occupying themselves with their music and horology, 
resolutely hostile to the favourite, whom they despised pro- 
foundly and with just cause, taking part secretly in underhand 
intrigues, and the more jealous of the appearance of consequence 
insomuch as they lacked the reality. 

They were not, however, old women, — the oldest was but 
thirty-eight; but they were already old maids, with the easily 
wpunded susceptibilities, the narrowness of mind, the instinct 
to rule, the timidity, the indirect methods, the little deceits, the 
jealousies, and the backbiting characteristic of that state. 

Madame Adelaide, the oldest of the three sisters, and also the 
most able, had brusque manners, a rough voice, a curt pronuncia- 



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32 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

tion, a certain masculine air which was not attractive. With a 
very exalted idea of the prerogatives of her rank, she suffered 
extremely from the insignificance to which she found herself 
reduced. Her mind, active, determined, and haughty, would 
gladly have aspired to an important r61e; but her talents not 
being great enough to support her pretensions, she avenged her- 
self for the effacement which mortified her by small machinations 
and malice. Hostile to any alliance with the Hapsburgs, she 
could not pardon her new niece the blood which ran in her veins. 
Monseiur Campan, on his departure with the household of the 
dauphiness to receive her at the frontier, had presented himself 
at the apartment of the old princess to ask if she had any com- 
mands. " If I had any orders to give," she replied dryly, *' they 
would not be to send for an Austrian." 

More amiable than her sister, Madame Victoire was also more 
lovable ; her household adored her. All those who came in con- 
tact with her were attracted by her unvarying kindliness, instinctive 
rather than the result of thought, but profound ; she loved to give 
pleasure. Her early stoutness gained for her on the part of the king 
— who, by force of living with people of low condition, finished by 
acquiring their language — a grotesque surname; and malicious 
tongues declared that this corpulence of the princess was the effect 
of the savoury dishes which her mattre d'hdtel served to her. She 
herself made no mystery of her tastes ; she avowed with a sweet 
simplicity her fondness for good cheer and the luxuries of life. 
" Here is an armchair which will be my destruction," she said 
one day to Madame Campan. Of an apathetic nature, she suc- 
cumbed to the ascendancy of her older sister, and allowed her 
to drag her into all sorts of malicious animosities which her 
heart often disavowed, but which her weak good-nature could 
not protest against 

Madame Sophie came between these two sisters ; she was with- 
out wit as without grace, always timid, flurried, silent, and morose, 
never opening her lips save when there was a storm, nor her eyes 
but to look out of the comers of them like a hare, and counted 
for nothing at the court ; she was but a minor satellite that re- 
volved docilely and blindly round Madame Adelaide. 

Finally Madame Louise, Madame Demiire, as Louis XV. had 
called her at her birth, — Madame Louise, after having shared the 
life of her sisters for twenty years, had suddenly a month before 
renounced all the pomps of the court and all the luxuries of life, 



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THE DAUPHIN. 33 



to which she was, however, by no means insensible. One day, 
the I ith of April, 1770, at seven o'clock in the morning, she left 
Versailles without informing any one but her father, impelled by 
a sudden determination to put into execution an aspiration which 
she had cherished for eighteen years, and accompanied by only one 
lady and equerry, betook herself to the convent of the Carmelites 
at St Denys, — the poorest of the order. The gates closed upon 
her; the daughter of France became the Mother Therfese of 
St. Augustin. The court was stupefied ; Mesdames seized with 
consternation. The king, in whom the heroic and unexpected 
resolution of Madame Louise awoke for a time, alas ! too short, the 
faith of his childhood, and who wrote letters to her wherein he 
spoke as an affectionate father and a believing Christian, — the 
king, though for a while disturbed in his habits by not finding 
Madame Derni^re with her sisters when he descended to take his 
coffee with them, soon resumed his old life, which his daughter 
was to expiate amid the austerities of the cloister. 

Determined to make her sacrifice complete, the princess would 
allow no relaxation of the rule, accepting the severest mortifica- 
tions and the most humiliating labours like the least novice. 
Unfortunately the turmoil of the world did not always die away 
at the gates of the convent at St. Denys. Mother Thir^se of 
St. Augustin remembered more than once that she was the 
daughter and the aunt of a king, and lent the authority of her 
voice and of her holy life to the political passions of her sisters 
and to their aspersions of their young niece, from whose hands, 
however, she had received the veil. 

As to the brothers and sisters of the dauphin, the Comte de 
Provence was possessed of a keen and cultivated mind, but was 
of doubtful character ; the Comte d' Artois was a brilliant trifler, 
with no thought but for his pleasures ; Mesdames Clotilde and 
Elisabeth, still in the hands of their governess, the Comtesse de 
Marsan, were too young to have any past, and it was uncertain 
whether they were to have a future ; they hardly counted at the 
court, and we hear nothing of them till later. 

But the dauphin himself, whose destiny Marie Antoinette was 
to share, — what was he? What was his character? Who had 
formed it? What might be argued from it in that solemn hour, 
when the future of a whole life might depend on the first contact 
of two hearts that were to be united by the most indissoluble of 
all ties? 

VOL. I. — 3 

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34 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

Louis Auguste, Due de Berry, third son of the dauphin, son of 
Louis XV. and of Marie Jos^phe of Saxe, was born on Aug. 23, 
1754. His birth, which took place unexpectedly at Versailles 
while the court was at Choisy, was not surrounded by all the 
solemn ceremony customary at the birth of Children of France ; 
and the courier charged to carry the news to the king was 
thrown from his horse and killed. Superstitious imaginations 
were struck by this sad incident, and the saying spread among 
the people that ** the new prince was not born to luck." 

The health of the Due de Berry was delicate. His governess, 
the Comtesse de Marsan, nie Rohan-Soubise, carried him to the 
country, to Bellevue. There the fresh air, exercise, and intelli- 
gent care soon triumphed over his original weakness. Under 
these fortifying influences, the temperament of the young prince 
acquired a vigour which it was never to lose; and when in the 
month of September, 1760, he was put into the hands of men, 
the dauphiness could well praise his robust appearance, in the 
same letter, alas ! in which she was obliged to acknowledge the 
growing feebleness of her oldest son, the Due de Bourgogne. 
Six months later, on the 22d of March, 1761, the Due de Bour- 
gogne died, and the Due de Berry became heir-presumptive to 
the throne. 

The governor of the Children of France was the Due de la 
Vauguyon, a brave soldier, but of a narrow and vain mind. Not 
understanding that the dauphin, once married, was his own mas- 
ter, he sought to impose his supervision over the intimacy of the 
young couple, and being defeated in his calculation by the firm- 
ness of Marie Antoinette, tried wickedly to separate those whom 
he could not rule. The under-governor was the Marquis de 
Sin^ty; the preceptor, Monseigneur de Co^tlosquet, bishop of 
Limoges; the under-preceptor was the Abb6 de Radonvilliers, 
whose post was perhaps the most important, as it brought him 
into daily contact with his pupil, and whose influence was the 
most lasting, for t\venty years later Necker accused him of gov- 
erning France. He was a man of "subtle and shrewd under- 
standing," according to the chargi (C affaires of Prussia. But the 
dauphin and dauphiness reserved the superintendence of their 
children's education for themselves. Unfortunately their enlight- 
ened direction did not long continue. The dauphin was carried 
away on the 20th of December, 1765; the dauphiness followed 
him to the grave on the 13th -of March, 1767. The Due de ia 



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THE DAUPHIN. 35 



Vauguyon alone remained in charge of the education of the heir 
to the crown. 

The instruction of the young prince was serious and solid. 
His father had insisted that he should not be taught by play, as 
certain philosophers recommended at that time, but by serious 
and sustained application. Even after the death of the dauphin, 
these severe precepts were observed. Thanks to them, the mind 
of the Due de Berry was furnished with useful and varied accom- 
plishments. He knew Latin literature so thoroughly as to be able 
to discuss in an hour sadly solemn the respective merits of Livy 
and Tacitus; he understood Italian, spoke German fairly, and 
knew English sufficiently well to translate various works. By a 
singular choice, which one might regard as an omen, his first 
translation was of the History of Charles I. by Hume. 

Here also he displayed his taste for history, which was his 
favourite study, and had no rival save perhaps in his fondness 
for geography. He was master of this latter science. To draw 
maps, to trace a map of the world, to construct the terrestrial 
sphere, — this was his pleasure; and we know that later it was he 
who prepared with his own hands instructions for the illustrious 
and unfortunate La Perouse, when he started on his great voyage 
round the world, from which he never returned. 

The care for his education kept pace with that for his studies ; 
but in the former the direction was not so fortunate, nor the 
result so satisfactory. If the preceptors of the young prince in- 
culcated in him a true and profound piety, a steadfast attachment 
to the Catholic faith, a purity of mind that could withstand the 
temptations of a corrupt court, they knew not how to subjoin to 
these virtues, which are the proper heritage of all mankind, 
those more especially suited to a sovereign. They neglected to 
teach him that a monarch should not only mete out justice, but 
that he should wield the truncheon of the commander ; and that 
he should know how, if need be, to draw his sword. They made 
of him a saint; they failed utterly in making of him a king. 

Of an intense nature, but somewhat lacking in energy, sluggish 
and undecided in character, and shut up within himself, the Due 
de BerrvhajJ many good qualities, but few that were lovable or 
strong. fWith his natural integrity, his admirable uprightness, 
his strong sense of justice, his ardent love for the people, he 
lacked that firmness which is imposing, and that outward charm 
and tact which pleases. Although he possessed in his whole 



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36 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

figure that air of dignity which the Bourbons never lost, and 
which his portraits plainly show; and while under impressive cir- 
cumstances and on days of public ceremony one was struck by 
the majesty of his appearance, — nevertheless in ordinary life 
his step was heavy, his figure thick, his speech rude. His good- 
nature too often degenerated into weakness, his frankness into 
brusqueness, his raillery into sharpness. He should have come 
in contact with the world to have laid a solid foundation for the 
talents God had given him, — to have acquired the form which 
he lacked, that polish of ease and affability so necessary to a 
prince destined to live in the midst of the most polite society and 
on the first throne of the world, and to have gained at the same 
time that knowledge of men and things without which no king 
can conduct himself or his kingdom. 

Instead of this, he was shut up in the most complete isolation. 
His father and mother, justly indignant at the scandals of the court, 
had made it a rule to live in retirement, and there to educate their 
children. After their death this tradition was too religiously re- 
spected. It developed in the young prince what are excellent 
qualities when confined within certain limitations, but which when 
carried too far become faults. It made him timid, awkward, dis- 
trustful of himself, "untamed," as Louis XV. said. "His mind 
insensibly contracted a habit of such exaggerated modesty," one 
historian wrote, " that he often sacrificed his own opinions to the 
most mediocre counsels." Surrounded by his brothers, whose 
talents, if less substantial, were more brilliant, the Due de Berry, 
become dauphin, saw the courtiers withdraw from him, and pay 
their homage to the Comte de Provence or to the Comte d'Artois. 
This disturbed him, and rendered him more irresolute than ever. 
His heart, wounded by these marks of disdain, or at least of in- 
difference, could not suppress a secret feeling of bitterness; and 
one day, when an orator from the country was complimenting him 
on his precocity, he replied : " You mistake, Monsieur. 'T is not 
I who am clever ; 't is my brother, De Provence." 

Deserted by the courtiers and neglected by the king, the 
dauphin buried himself in his solitary studies and manual labours. 
His robust physique had need of muscular exercise; he had a 
tower built, and organized workshops for carpentry and lock- 
smith's work. It was in occupations of this sort that he passed 
the hours not given up to his studies or to the chase. The chase 
and the forge were his two favourite pastimes, one might almost 



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THE DAUPHIN. 37 



say his two passions. He bad a third, even greater, — the passion 
for doing good ; unfortunately he had no knowledge of how to 
do it His life, isolated and thoughtful, might well have made 
him conceive a horror of the abuses he saw in the government, 
and inspired him with an ardent desire to correct them, but it was 
not able to give him that experience of the world without which 
one acts at venture, nor that energetic decision without which 
one falls into error. 

With his retired habits, his cold and self-contained nature, his 
close reserve, it was impossible for the dauphin to be a wise 
director for the young wife confided to his care, nor a very affec- 
tionate husband. " He is not like other men," his grandfather 
said of him. Only a few days after his marriage, on the 23d of 
May, he said to tKe dauphiness, on entering her room in the 
morning, " Have you slept well?" to which Marie Antoinette re- 
plied, ** Yes ; " and the interview of husband and wife, then in their 
full honeymoon, limited itself to this brief exchange of words. 

The poor dauphiness, whose tender and loving heart only 
asked to be repaid in kind, was quite chagrined by his coldness, 
which she could not understand. Her husband had indeed de- 
clared to his aunts that he had found her very amiable, and was 
pleased with her; she would have liked it better had he kept his 
satisfaction less shut up within himself; she felt sad and home- 
sick at that court, where she found no demonstrative affection in 
response to hers, nor support for her first steps. She tried vainly 
to conquer the melancholy which took possession of her; her 
mind, if for a moment diverted, soon returned to its gloomy re- 
flections, and fell again into revery. " My heart aches for her," 
Vermond wrote. 



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CHAPTER IV. 

Intrigues at Court. — Rival Parties. — Espionage of the Due 

DE LA VaUGUYON. — ThE SUCCESSFUL D6bUT OF THE DAUPHINESS. 

— The Comtesse de Gramont. — One of Marie Antoinette's 
Days; her Reading. — Counsels of Maria Theresa. — After 
Some Resistance the Daupuiness follows them. 

RARELY, we believe, was a court more divided, more given up 
to factions, to underhand manoeuvres, to envy and malice, 
than was the court of France in 1770. Two parties struggled for 
power : one, which was the party in the ascendant at that epoch, 
was called the Choiseul party, and had at its head the minister 
who had strengthened the Austrian alliance, and concluded the 
marriage of the dauphin to Marie Antoinette. He had with him 
public opinion, the Parliaments, or at least the Parliamentarians. 
The other, which was called the party of dhwts^ — though in real- 
ity the majority of those who composed it cared very little about 
religion ; but they had gathered about them all who resented Choi- 
seul's expulsion of the Jesuits, — had for its heads the Chancellor 
Maupeou, the Comtesse de Marsan, governess of the Children of 
France, who — one must do her that justice — succeeded in in- 
spiring her pupils, Mesdames Clotilde and Elisabeth, with genuine 
sentiments of piety, but who was intriguing and vindictive, and 
who brought with her the powerful family of Rohan; the Due 
d'Aiguillon, the enemy of La Chalotais, the despotic and stupid 
governor of Bretagne, who was upheld by the entire influence of 
the family of Richelieu ; and the Due de la Vauguyon, the pre- 
tentious and mediocre governor of whom we have already spoken, 
but whose office gave him an importance at the court. Mesdames, 
in memory of their brother and out of hatred for Choiseul, inclined 
toward the second party ; and the ambitious Maupeou had also 
succeeded in enlisting Madame du Barry, who could not forgive 
the minister for the proud independence with which he treated 
her. 



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ESPIONAGE OF THE DUG DE LA VAUGUYON. 39 

Between these two principal factions which divided the court 
^ere numerous minor ambitions, petty spites, yulgar and often- 
times shameful passions. It is not for us to delineate here a pic- 
ture of French society during the latter part of the reign of Louis 
XV.; the traits of it are well known, and are found in every 
chronicle of the time. But it was a sad spectacle for a child of fif- 
teen, chaste and pure, — that world of Versailles, where too often, 
in accordance with the, example set by the master and his favourite, 
men had wives but to desert them, and women husbands but to 
betray them. It was difficult to walk on that slippery ground, 
and any false step was singularly dangerous. Whatever may have 
been Marie Antoinette's desire to hold aloof from political par- 
ties, it was impossible for her to escape them. From the moment 
of her appearance she was perforce classed with one or the other of 
the rival factions. Her gratitude and the counsels of her mother 
placed her in Choiseul's camp. This was enough to mark her 
for the hatred, cavilling, and machinations of every enemy of 
Choiseul. Some sought to undermine her influence before she 
possessed any; others, who were more adroit, sought to dominate 
her. Before Marie Antoinette was a month at Versailles she was 
entangled in such a network of intrigues as to be almost inextri- 
cable. Everything furnished material for mischief, complots, 
conflicts. It was the Abbfe de Vermond whom they sought to 
remove ; it was the Comtesse de Noailles whom they tried to 
estrange by a thousand vexations. Then it was a waiting-woman 
of doubtful fidelity whom they wished to introduce into the house- 
hold of the dauphiness, or a suspected confessor whom they 
tried to give her. They made an effort to prejudice the king 
against her by spreading the report that she had refused to accom- 
pany him on his journeys. They used their utmost endeavours to 
alienate her husband from her. 

This last task devolved upon the Due de la Vauguyon. The 
former governor, being eager to preserve his ascendancy over the 
prince, whom he wished to dominate, and fearful of the influence 
that a fresh and charming young wife might gain over that un- 
spoiled and virginal nature, spared no effort to separate husband 
and wife. Contrary to all etiquette, and despite the opposition of 
the Comtesse de Noailles, he claimed to have at all hours and by 
private passages entrance not only to the dauphin's apartment 
but to the dauphiness*s. He even went further. One day Marie 
Antoinette and her husband were together in their apartment. 



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40 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

A valet de chambre^ who was " either a fool or a good fellow," 
suddenly threw open the door, and they perceived Monsieur de la 
Vauguyon, who had crept up stealthily to listen, and who re- 
mained there rooted to the spot. Disconcerted at being thus 
detected, and unable to retreat, the duke found nothing to say 
in his defence. The dauphiness took occasion to rejJresent to 
her husband the inconvenience of the indecent conduct of his 
governor ; and the dauphin took her remonstrances in good part, 
feeling that they were but too just. 

Despite all these cabals and pitfalls Marie Antoinette's advent 
was a success; we have it from a perfectly unprejudiced witness, 
a pamphUtaire, The king felt himself regenerated at the sight 
of that beautiful and pure child, whose appearance at Versailles, 
where too often virtue was dull and beauty licentious, had for a 
moment cleared the atmosphere of the court. He remarked in- 
deed that she was somewhat gay, somewhat childish, but that, he 
immediately added, was but natural to her age. 

In reality he found her charming. ** I have my Duchesse de 
Bourgogne again," he often said. The public was charmed 
with the affability of the young princess; even the oldest court- 
iers were enraptured. Choiseul, after a conversation with her, 
was enthusiastic. ** I never saw any one to equal her at her age," 
he said. And the Due de Noailles, ** the wittiest man in France, 
and the one who best understood the sovereign and the court," 
declared to Mercy that beyond doubt, "judging by the qualities 
one perceived in the princess, her charms would one day gain an 
all-powerful influence over the king." 

The ladies of the dauphiness were not less pleased by the 
consideration she manifested for them, and the protection she 
accorded them. One notable example in the beginning showed 
with what ardour and firmness she could defend them on occasion. 
At Choisy during a performance the ladies of the palace had taken 
possession of the front seats, and refused to make room for the 
Comtesse du Barry and two of her intimate friends. There were 
some very sharp remarks exchanged ; the favourite complained ; 
and the king, yielding to her plaints, exiled one of the ladies of the 
dauphiness, the Comtesse de Gramont, who had been among 
the most outspoken against Madame du Barry, to fifteen leagues 
from the court. Some months later Madame de Gramont, being 
taken ill, requested permission to return to Paris, and begged 
Marie Antoinette to intercede in her favour. The young princess 



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HER GROWING INFLUENCE. 41 

immediately sought her grandfather and laid before him with 
much grace and sweetness the request of her lady-in-waiting. 
The king, embarrassed as he always was under similar circum- 
stances, put her off. The dauphiness insisted. " Madame," re- 
plied Louis XV., rather dryly, " have I not told you that I should 
give you an answer?" "But, Papa," the princess cried eagerly, 
" aside from reasons of humanity and justice, think what grief 
it would be for me should a lady attached to my service die while 
under your displeasure.** The king smiled, and promised his 
granddaughter to satisfy her. He immediately charged the Due 
de la Vrillifere to inquire into the condition of Madame de Gra- 
mont, and two days later, despite the opposition of Madame du 
Barry, he ordered permission to be sent to the invalid to return 
to Paris. La Vrillifere, who was intimately connected with the 
favourite, sent the permission, but unwillingly. Either from ill- 
will or forgetfulness, he neglected to inform the dauphiness of hav- 
ing done so. The dauphiness sent for him. " Monsieur," she said 
to him in a tone full of dignity, ** in dealing with a petition with 
which I had charged you, and which concerned a lady in my ser- 
vice, I should have been the first to be informed, and by you, of 
the decision of the king with regard to it ; but I see. Monsieur, 
that you treat me as though I were a child, and I am very well 
content to tell you that I shall not forget it." 

La Vrilli^re, confused, stammered a few poor excuses. The 
court was surprised at her proud language ; and Madame Ad61aTde, 
admiring a courage of which she would not have been capable, 
could not refrain from saying to her niece, not perhaps without a 
touch of envy, ** T is easy to see that you are not of our race." 

Despite the divergence of ideas and difference of attitude, 
Mesdames themselves at that moment had fallen under her 
charm ; and Madame AdilaTde, for an instant oblivious of her 
prejudices, gave Marie Antoinette a key to their apartment, so 
that she might go to them without her suite and without being 
seen. There was no one, not even excepting the dauphin, who 
did not succumb to the ascendancy of the young woman. His 
character, somewhat reserved and self-contained, began to blos- 
som in contact with her grace and good-humour. " Since we 
must live together in intimate friendship," the princess said to 
him one day, *' we should discuss everything with confidence." 
And their conversation began in fact to be confidential and inti- 
mate, touching upon the most delicate subjects, — upon Madame 
du Barry, and upon the Due de Choiseul. 

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42 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

Such a triumph was indeed too brilliant to last, and the faithful 
Mercy, who well knew the court of Versailles and the French 
character, was not blind as to the results of this flattering begin- 
ning. " Without allowing myself to be dazzled by the well-de- 
served success of Madame the Dauphiness," he wrote on the 15th 
of June, 1770, " I reflect that in the midst of a gay and inconstant 
nation, and in an extremely stormy court, it is more easy to win 
favour at the start than to preserve it for any length of time." 
There were too many people whose interest it was to destroy this 
budding influence, and moreover the qualities of the young prin- 
cess were too brilliant not to be dangerous. Impulsive, free from 
all calculation or ulterior motive, she rarely was able to hide 
her feelings, and this very spontaneity which was one of her 
charms was also one of her perils. Her ready confidence exposed 
her, unarmed, to the intrigues of her surroundings, as her kind 
heart left her without defence against solicitations and importu- 
nities. Lively, ardent, full of gayety and life, fond of pleasure, 
inclined to raillery, it was difficult for her to submit herself to re- 
flection or constraint. There were, moreover, so many distractions 
at the court, so many social and family obligations, that there was 
scarce time to think of any regular instruction. 

Would you like to know how Marie Antoinette employed her 
time during the first months of her sojourn in France? Here is 
a description which she gave her mother in a letter written on the 
1 2th of July, 1770: — 

** I rise at ten o'clock or at nine or at half-past nine, and having dressed 
myself, say my morning prayers ; then I breakfast, and afterwards I go to 
my aunts, where I usually find the king. This lasts until half-past ten ; 
then at eleven I have my hair dressed. At noon the chamber is an- 
nounced, and every one can enter who is not a common person. I put 
on my rouge and wash my hands before them all ; then the men retire, and 
the ladies remain and I dress myself before them. There is mass at noon. 
If the king is at Versailles, I go with him and my husband and aunts to 
mass ; if he is not there, I go alone with Monsieur the Dauphin, but always 
at the same hour. After mass the two of us dine in public ; but that is over 
at half-past one, for we both eat very fast From there I go to the apart- 
ment of Monsieur the Dauphin, or if he is busy, I return to my own. I 
read, I write, or I work ; for I am now working a vest for the king which 
does not get on very rapidly, but which I hope with the grace of God to 
have finished in a few years. At three o'clock I go again to my aunts, 
where the king also goes at that hour. 



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HER READING. 43 



" At four the abbd comes to me ; at five every day a teacher of the 
harpsichord or of singing, and remains until six. At half-past six I almost 
always go to my aunts if I do not go to walk ; I must tell you that my 
husband almost always goes with me to my aunts. There is play from 
seven to nine o'clock ; but when the weather is fine, I go for a walk, and 
then there is no play in my apartment, but in that of my aunts. At nine 
o'clock we sup, and when the king is not there my aunts come and sup 
with us ; but when the king is there we go and sup with them. We wait 
for the king, who usually comes at a quarter to eleven ; as for me, while I 
wait I throw myself on a large sofa and sleep until the arrival of the king ; 
but when he is not there we go to bed at eleven." 

At Choisy the day was still longer, and the play was often kept 
up till half-past one in the morning. 

In this programme, at once so full and so empty, in this life so 
occupied, yet without any true occupations, where could one find 
time for any serious pursuits, — we will not say studies, but simply 
reading ? Marie Antoinette hardly had time to write to her mother ; 
she was often obliged to do it while at her toilette, and yet we 
know how well she loved her. If time were wanting for the 
accomplishment of a duty which was so imperative and so dear 
Jto her heart, how was she to find time each day for steady applica- 
tion, very useful, no doubt, but which should have preceded her 
marriage, and for which, it must be confessed, she had always 
very little inclination? " She has an excellent and ready under- 
standing, which grasps and retains what she reads," Mercy 
wrote; ** but she devotes too little time to that employment." 

This was a source of great anxiety to Maria Theresa. She felt 
that the education of her daughter had not received sufficient 
attention at Vienna ; and she would have been glad to have her 
perfect it at Versailles, also to have her find time, in the midst 
of the frivolous round of the court, for some solid reading as a 
supplement to her instruction. She returned to this point inces- 
santly in her letters, and begged to receive an account of such 
reading, and even that a journal of it should be kept for her 
benefit. Marie Antoinette was greatly embarrassed by this de- 
mand; her natural vivacity, the petulance characteristic of her 
age, her repugnance to apply a mind easily distracted, her fre- 
quent visits to her aunts, her walks during the fine season, her 
desire to discuss the thousand objects, " interesting because of 
their beauty or novelty," did not always allow her to keep regu- 
larly the hour appointed for reading in the programme, already so 



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44 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

crowded, of the day. Not that she was always idle. Several times 
Mercy had occasion to praise her faithfulness to her work ; and 
Vermond remarked that her language had improved, and that 
she expressed herself " easily, agreeably, and nobly on occasion 
and on notable subjects." But there were times when she took 
more interest in her first waiting-woman's little boy, or in the 
gambols of her little dog Mop, than in the " Lettres du Comte 
de Tessin," or in the *' Bagatelles morales " of the Abb^ Coyer. 
She knew not therefore what to reply to her mother. Too frank 
to dissemble the truth, it also cost her too much to acknowledge 
it. Moreover, it was not so simple a matter as it would seem to 
give the account which the empress demanded. The young prin- 
cess, as was natural enough, did not wish to write it, or to have 
anything known of it ; her vanity would have blushed before her 
husband and aunts to seem to be still in the schoolroom. Yet how 
was she to write it without having her letters and abstracts seen ? 
Whether rightly or wrongly, Marie Antoinette believed that 
none of her papers were safe from inspection ; she was afraid of 
duplicate keys. Not knowing what to do, she did what most 
people do in a perplexing situation, — she did nothing. Despite 
her docility in the face of her counsellors, her submission to her 
mother, and her respect for and confidence in her, she did not re- 
ply to her pressing questions. The empress became vexed ; she 
returned to the charge with a severity that bordered upon injustice, 
and an insistence that ended by irritating Marie Antoinette. 

" Try to furnish out your mind with a little good reading. ... Do not 
neglect this resource, which is more necessary to you than to another, 
since you have learned neither music, nor drawing, nor dancing, nor paint- 
ing, nor any pleasing accomplishment I return, then, to your reading ; 
and you must charge the abb^ to send me every month an account of 
what you have finished and of what you intend to begin." 

This time the lesson was too severe ; it overpassed the mark. 
** See, Monsieur I'Abb^," she said to Vermond ; ** if any one saw 
that, it would redound greatly to my Jionour indeed ! " And 
having read the passage we have just quoted, she added angrily, 
" Truly, she would make me pass for an animal ! " Then calming 
herself a little, she continued : " Ah, well ! I shall answer that it 
will be impossible for me to undertake any reading during the 
Carnival, but that I shall do so in Lent. Will that do? " " Yes, 
Madame, provided that you are in earnest." 



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COUNSELS OF MARIA THERESA, 45 

We have given this little scene, as it serves to show Marie 
Antoinette's character at this period, and the nature of her rela- 
tions with Maria Theresa, — incessant direction, for the most 
part imperiously given, from the mother ; and on the part of the 
daughter a little impatience at this hidden surveillance and per- 
petual scolding; sometimes a fleeting determination to escape 
from it, and, what was very human, an effort to put off, perhaps 
with the intention of eluding, a wearisome task ; but at bottom, 
sincere respect and genuine docility, which was only thwarted by 
the thousand interruptions of her day and her extreme vivacity 
of disposition. 

But Maria Theresa was not satisfied with this promise, which 
seemed to her but a subterfuge. In the following letter she 
insists afresh : — 

" I await with impatience to learn, on the return of this courier, of your 
reading and industry. It is permissible — above all, at your age — to amuse 
oneself; but to make it one's sole occupation, to do nothing that is solid 
or useful, to kill time between walks and visits, — in the end you will real- 
ize the emptiness of it, and will feel many regrets for not having better 
employed your time. I must again repeat to you that the handwriting 
of your letters becomes every day worse and less correct In these ten 
months you should have improved. I was greatly humiliated on seeing 
something you had written to some ladies pass through several hands; 
you must practise with the abb^, or with some one else, to form a better 
hand, and to write more evenly." 

Marie Antoinette might have answered that it would have been 
difficult for her to do in ten months at Versailles, in the midst of 
distractions without number, what they had failed to teach her in 
ten years at Vienna in the quiet of the schoolroom. But she was 
too respectful. She was, moreover, sincere in her promise to 
occupy herself more seriously during Lent ; and she was faithful 
in doing so. From the month of March she sent a journal of 
her reading, which she pursued with more regularity. The Abb^ 
de Vermond himself asserted that the dauphiness's ideas were 
becoming ** more system^ic and her language more connected." 
With her vivacity of disposition, it was difficult without doubt to 
avoid relapses. Sometimes Marie Antoinette's interest in her 
waiting-woman's boy, or a gallop on her horse or her donkey, or 
her walks during the summer, and the amusements of the Carnival 
during the winter would interrupt her studies. But it is certain 
— and the impartial reports of Mercy prove it — that the young 



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46 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

girl made a sincere effort to keep her promise to her mother. 
The faithful ambassador notes a change for the better in his 
august pupil. The conversations with the Abbe de Vermond be- 
came longer, more serious, and more instructive* Music, dan- 
cing, and embroidery alternated with her studies. Sometimes the 
reading lasted for several hours, the dauphiness herself reading, 
or else the Abb^ de Vermond, while she busied herself with some 
handiwork, for which she ever manifested great fondness. The 
choice of books was of such a kind as to form her understanding, 
— well-written letters, sermons, historical treatises, and memoirs, 
sometimes plays, but never novels or other frivolous books, for 
which she exhibited no curiosity. They read the " Anecdotes de 
la Cour de Philippe-Auguste," the " M^moires de TEstoile," the 
" Lettres d'une m^re k sa fille," the " Livre de Tobie," the " Petit- 
Car^me" by Massillon, the works of Bossuet, Hume's " History 
of England." In short, she soon found herself more learned in 
history, and particularly in French history, than the princes and 
princesses of the royal family. She did more : from pupil, she 
became mentor, and had the " M^moires de Sully" read to the 
dauphin. 

For herself she laid out a whole plan of study, and in order to 
render the promise which she made to herself somewhat more 
binding, she made a memorandum of it. 

At this time Mercy wrote of her: — 

" It seems that her Royal Highness has wished to bind herself to a con- 
stant and invariable routine, and to help her to do so has written a sort of 
memorandum of the disposition of the hours of her day, which she has had 
the goodness to read to me. It says that on rising Madame TArchiduchesse 
will employ the first moments in prayer, then that she will busy herself with 
her music, dancing, and one hour of * sensible reading ; * this is the expres- 
sion used in her memorandum. Her toilette, a visit to the king, mass, and 
dinner will occupy the rest of the morning. In the afternoon there is an 
hour and a half assigned to the continuation of the sensible reading ; a 
walk or the hunt, and conversation with Monsieur the Dauphin and with 
the others of the royal family, find their respective places. I have respect- 
fully exhorted Madame the Dauphiness not to depart from so wise and 
well-arranged a plan. She answered with her usual good faith, ' I know 
not if I shall fulfil all this very exactly, btit I shall hold myself to it as far 
as possible.* " 

When one compares this programme with the one of July 12, 
1770, one can judge of the progress made in two years. And, in 

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HER OBEDIENCE TO MARIA THERESA. 47 

fact, with the exception of a little dissipation the following sum- 
mer, — above all, during a journey to Compi^gne, where the walks 
and hunting allowed of but little assiduity, — Marie Antoinette was 
faithful to this plan. The repugnance which she had at first mani- 
fested for serious pursuits had disappeared. From this time forth 
she gave herself up to them, not only without distaste, but with 
pleasure. During the month of November, despite the distractions 
of the autumn, she devoted two hours a day to them. Amid the 
celebrations of the marriage of the Comte d*Artois she reserved 
one hour for meditation. And when winter brought with it 
greater calm and liberty, it was not one hour but two that the 
dauphiness consecrated to reading and the commentaries with 
which the Abb^ de Vermond accompanied it, and two hours more 
for music and dancing. " In this way," Mercy wrote, ** the days 
are sufficiently well filled, and I think that Your Majesty has every 
reason to be satisfied with her." 



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CHAPTER V. 

What must be thought of Maria Theresa's Reproofs. — The 
Counsellors of Marie Antoinette. — The Comte de Mercy; 
HIS Means of Information. — The Abb^ de Vermond. — Marie 
Antoinette's Fondness for Riding. — The Influence of Mes- 
dames. — How this Influence was gained. — The Household 
of the Dauphiness. — The Comtesse- de Noailles — Madame 
L'fiTiQUETTE. — The Comtesse de Coss6 and the Comtesse de 
Mailly. — The Taking of the Veil by Madame Louise. — The 
Disadvantage of the Influence of Mesdames upon their 
Niece. — The Comtesse de Narbonne and the Marquise 
DE Durfort. — The Relation of the King and Marie An- 
toinette. — Diminution of the Influence of Mesdames. — The 
Dissatisfaction of Madame AofeLAifDE; her Spitefulness. 

THE absence of serious pursuits was the principal, but not 
the only reproach which Maria Theresa addressed to Marie 
Antoinette. Her maternal solicitude was ever on the alert, and 
was directed toward everything; and one is truly justified in 
thinking that if she had devoted half as much anxious surveil- 
lance to the education of her daughter as she exercised over 
her conduct at Versailles, many of the faults of which she was 
later the most merciless censor might have been corrected. We 
must not, however, always take her reproofs literally. The em- 
press often exaggerated the evil in order more effectually to 
arouse the amour-propre of the dauphiness, and to ** give her soul 
a shake." She herself acknowledges that she often wrote too 
severely in order to wake her from her "lethargy." She was 
exactly informed of everything that occurred at Versailles by her 
faithful minister, the Comte de Mercy- Argenteau, — one of the 
most original figures, perhaps, of that epoch. Mercy, who had 
represented Austria at Paris for several years, knew the court of 
France by heart, had studied all its personages, learned thoroughly 
all its springs and intrigues, and, charged by his sovereign to 
support and direct the steps of the archduchess on that slippery 



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THE COMTE DE MERCY. 49 

ground, fulfilled his mission to the end with a devotion, perspicu- 
ity, vigilance, and sincerity beyond all praise. 

It is curious to investigate the complicated system by means of 
which the clever diplomat was able to follow day by day and 
almost hour by hour the actions of his pupil. With regard to this 
system he wrote as follows : — 

•* I am sure of three persons in the service of Madame TArchiduchesse, 
— one of her waiting- women and two lackeys, who give me an exact ac- 
count of all that passes in her rooms. I am informed each day of the 
conversations of the archduchess with the Abb6 de Vermond, from whom 
she conceals nothing ; I learn through the Marquise de Durfort the least 
detail of all that is said in the apartment of Mesdames, and I have a greater 
number of people and sources through which I hear all that takes place in 
the king's apartment when Madame the Dauphiness is there. To these I 
add my own obser\'ations, so that there is not an hour in the day when I 
am not prepared to give an account of what Madame TArchiduchesse may 
have said or done or heard ; . . . and I have pushed my researches to this 
extent because I knew that your Majesty's peace depended upon it." 

It must be said for the honour of the ambassador that he hid 
nothing from the empress. He never asserted a fact without the 
most absolute certainty of it, nor did he ever conceal one if he 
were sure of it; never — for he had given his promise, and he 
kept it — never did he seek to tranquillize his august sovereign at 
the expense of the truth ; he told her everything, — trivial faults 
as well as more serious defects. 

And what is more necessary to note, he showed so much tact 
in the fulfilment of his delicate mission, he knew so well how to 
disguise the odious side of it, and to temper what might have 
seemed hard by a devotion above all proof and an almost pater- 
nal affection, — that Marie Antoinette, watched, spied upon, if you 
will, scolded by him respectfully but mercilessly, never was angry 
with him for it ; she did not always follow his counsels, but she 
never lost her temper with him. nor was her confidence in him 
ever shaken. " T is most fortunate," Mercy wrote, ** that Madame 
the Dauphiness honours us, the abbe and me, with her confidence, 
and that she shows us greater kindness, inasmuch as we tell her 
the truth without circumlocution and without flattery.*' This 
acknowledgment under such difficult circumstances does as much 
honour to the pupil as to the mentor. 

The assistant of Mercy in this delicate mission was, as we have 
already seen, the Abb^ de Vermond, who, from being the precep- 
VOL. I. — 4 

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so LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

tor of the archduchess of Austria, had become reader to the dau- 
phiness of France, ** in order to continue the functions he had 
discharged at Vienna, of guiding and perfecting the accomplish- 
ments which Madame the Dauphiness manifested so great a desire 
to cultivate." Despite many vexations and a few periods of dis- 
couragement, he remained steadfast to the task confided to him. 
His eyes, he has himself said, were ever open, alternately be- 
cause of disquietude or delight. The jealousies of his rivals and 
court spites have calumniated him. Madame Campan has rep- 
resented him as Marie Antoinette's evil genius, — as an intrigu- 
ing, domineering, and ambitious man. History to-day, being 
better informed, has rehabilitated the Ahh6 de Vermond, and 
restored to him his true character. If we are justified in accusing 
him of not always bqing disinterested, — and yet the abbacies 
which he demanded, according to the usages of that epoch, rep- 
resented but a mediocre revenue for a man obliged to live at 
court, and whose emoluments were not paid with any regularity, 

— if we must regret that his guidance was not always very en- 
lightened, we must recognize in him a zealous and intelligent 
collaborator of the Comte de Mercy in the work of protection and 
preservation which Maria Theresa had confided to him ; an acute 
observer, a devoted servitor of Marie Antoinette, — the only one 
of her household, according to the ambassador, who did her real 
service, by " telling her the truth, and making her feel it." 

Thanks to this double supervision, so well guarded by a double 
affection, Maria Theresa could at Vienna follow all the actions of 
her daughter. She followed her at Versailles, at Fontainebleau, 
at Compi^gne ; she followed her to the ball, to the hunt, to her 
apartment. As soon as any difficulty was sighted, a letter was 
immediately despatched from Schoenbrunn or from Laxemburg, 

— a letter of reprimand or of counsel. If she saw that the dau- 
phiness was growing negligent in her bearing, or that her figure 
was being spoiled, she wrote to her to wear stays ; and after some 
reluctance Marie Antoinette submitted to do so. But she was not 
always so docile ; and a new influence was about to combat and 
sometimes to triumph over that of her mother. 

Soon after her arrival in France the archduchess expressed a 
desire to ride. The empress was frightened ; at fifteen, while still 
growing, it seemed to her that it would be a risk which might 
entail dangerous consequences for the future. She appealed to 
Choiseul ; and the king, forewarned by his minister, did not give 



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INFLUENCE OF MESDAMES. $1 

the permission which the dauphiness solicited ; he only allowed 
her to mount a donkey. A very gentle one was chosen, and this 
new amusement gave great pleasure to the young princess. But 
soon the donkey ceased to satisfy her ; she had so many good 
reasons to prefer a nobler mount. Her aunts encouraged her ; 
the king and the dauphin, who loved to hunt, would have been 
delighted to have her accompany them ; they were at Fontaine- 
bleau; the occasion was propitious. Madame Adelaide under- 
took to overcome the difficulties and obtain the king's permission. 
A horse was secretly conveyed with the donkey to a place agreed 
upon in the forest ; and when the dauphiness arrived she sent away 
the donkey and jumped upon the horse. She was very proud of, 
but also somewhat embarrassed by, her small victory. What 
should she say to Mercy's objections? How escape her mothers 
reproaches? She compromised by promising never to follow the 
hunt ; but the opportunity, the pleasure, a crowd of excuses, good 
or bad, tempted her often to break this pledge. Maria Theresa 
returned more than once to this delicate subject; finding it im- 
possible to overcome her daughter's strong inclination for this 
diversion, she resigned herself to cautioning her to be careful, 
which advice was usually followed. 

It was Mesdames, as we have just seen, who counselled the dau- 
phiness to try this new species of recreation, and who tempted 
her for the first time to disobey her mother. Their influence at 
that moment was preponderant, and Maria Theresa was justly 
alarmed at it When her daughter had set out for France, she 
had felt obliged to say to her : " Ix>ve your aunts ; those princesses 
have many virtues and talents ; it is fortunate for you. I hope 
that you will deserve their friendship." What other guidance 
indeed could she recommend in the royal family? The dauphin 
was too young and inexperienced himself to direct the youth and 
inexperience of his wife. 

As for the king, he had never asserted any authority over his 
children. He had never been able to bring himself to govern 
them, to advise them, or to correct them in any way whatsoever. 
He loved his family, but with that selfish affection which does 
not wish to give or take trouble. Provided that he was not in- 
terfered with in his pleasures, he allowed others every liberty in 
their amusements. 

There was of course Mercy, who had the entire confidence of 
the empress, and who deserved it. '* See Mercy often," Maria 



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52 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

Theresa repeated to her daughter incessantly. " Follow all the 
counsels he gives you." " Mercy is charged to speak plainly 
to you." And by the side of Mercy was Vermond. But Ver- 
mond occupied only a subordinate position ; and Mercy, being a 
foreign minister, and consequently looked upon with suspicion at 
the court of France, was bound to an extreme reserve, and could 
have audience only once or twice a week. In any case, neither 
of them could be society for the young princess. 

If from the royal family we turn to the household of the dau- 
phiness, we find in the first place her lady of honour, the Comtesse 
de Noailles, " Madame I'Etiquette," as Marie Antoinette called 
her in jest. She was a woman of irreproachable conduct, but 
possessed of a seriousness that was somewhat heavy, and of a 
mind somewhat limited, joining to a stiff bearing and an austere 
manner little tricks of flattery which the keen wit of her young 
mistress could not fail to detect. The exaggerated importance 
which she attached to wearisome regulations, many of which had a 
reason for existing, but others of which were childish and whose 
use, moreover, she did not explain, exasperated the dauphiness, 
while her obsequious complaisance irritated her. Despite these 
disadvantages Madame de Noailles was perhaps the one woman 
at the court who was well suited to her high office. The exalted 
position of her family had prepared her for it, and her own incon- 
testable virtue rendered her worthy of it. Mercy made use of 
her more than once to counteract the all-powerful influence of 
Mesdames. 

Next to her came the lady of the bedchamber, the Duchesse 
de Coss6, daughter of the Due de Nivernais, — a reserved young 
woman with abundance of discretion, who added to the charm 
of a clear understanding great tact, and of whom the empe- 
ror one day declared that in her head an English mind was 
found side by side with a French imagination ; she was, more- 
over, sincerely devoted and sincerely beloved, and when later the 
illness of her son forced her to resign her office, she left to the 
queen, under the title of a *' testament of fidelity," some excellent 
advice concerning the intrigues of the court and the traps which 
were spread for her. 

Among the other ladies of the dauphiness's household some 
were gentle and intelligent, like the Marquise de Mailly, a per- 
fectly good woman, though heedless; but while these were 
in every way irreproachable, they offered no kind of support. 



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INFLUENCE OF MESDAMES. 53 

Others, like Madame de Chimay, though of undoubted virtue, 
failed to inspire confidence either in the ambassador or the 
princess ; and others again no longer possessed a spotless repu- 
tation, — as, for example, the Duchesse de Chaulnes, witty but 
bad, who crowned a series of adventures and extravagances by 
an absurd marriage. 

Considering all things, and especially the situation of affairs we 
have just described, it was but natural that Marie Antoinette 
should draw near to her aunts, and that her mother should en- 
courage her to do so. Mercy himself, who knew the court so 
well, recognized the advantages of this intimacy, but he soon 
added that she should not give herself up to it without a certain 
amount of circumspection. What seems most surprising to us at 
first is that Mesdames, with their prejudices against the Austrian 
alliance, should have lent themselves so readily to the intimacy. 
Did they think that they were fulfilling a duty toward their young 
niece, cast without pilot or rudder upon the stormy sea of Ver- 
sailles? Or did they too yield to the power of that grace which 
held every one as by a charm? Or was it calculation on their 
part; and, jealous of the new influence that had appeared on the 
horizon of the court, did they embrace their rival in order the 
better to strangle her? We would not like to swear that this 
consideration was wholly absent from the motives which guided, 
if not the three sisters, — we would gladly make exception of 
the worthy Madame Victoi re, — at least Madame Adelaide, the 
politician of the family, and the recognized head of that august 
trinity which reigned in the private apartments of the chateau. 

The arrival of the dauphiness upset all their projects and 
forced them again into a secondary position. After the death of 
Marie Josiphe of Saxe, Mesdames held after their father the 
highest rank at court: the king's play was held in their apart- 
ment. In the future this function would belong to the dauphiness. 
That Madame Adelaide should look upon this change with dis- 
pleasure seems scarcely doubtful. From that to hiding her dis- 
pleasure beneath an amiable exterior, and seeking to destroy an 
influence against which she might have found it difficult to strug- 
gle, by dominating and absorbing it, was a natural transition, a 
plan which would tempt the scheming mind of the daughter of 
Louis XV. 

Whatever may have been the reason, the intimacy between the 
niece and aunts was established from the beginning. Charmed 



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54 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

by their advances, and feeling the necessity of support, the young 
princess yielded to it with that spontaneity and frankness which 
was the basis and attraction of her character. 

A touching ceremonial which soon occurred served in a way as 
a further bond of union. On the loth of October, 1770, after the 
five months of waiting insisted upon by her father, Madame Lou- 
ise took the veil of the Carmelites of St. Denys, and it was from 
the hands of the dauphiness that she received it. Despite the 
reluctance of the humble sister the ceremony was one of great 
splendour. The Papal Nuncio was present, and twenty-two 
bishops assisted ; and the daughter of France for that one day 
resumed the costume and following of a powerful princess. But 
when after the usual question, she reappeared in the choir, de- 
prived of her rich array and clad in a coarse habit, to kneel at the 
feet of her niece, all eyes were wet, and the dauphiness herself 
watered with her tears the scapular and cloak with which she in- 
vested the humble postulant. 

Both Mesdames and the king felt that they had not sufficient 
fortitude to be present at this great sacrifice ; it would have cut 
them to the heart, so says a letter from a Carmelite ; they gath- 
ered eagerly, however, every echo of it from the lips of their 
niece ; and it would seem that the frieiidship of Marie Antoinette 
and her aunts was strengthened by this noble example and noble 
lesson. 

The effects of their influence were soon apparent. Mesdames 
were timid even with their father ; they cared not for the world ; 
they were fearful of appearing in public ; they lived in a small 
circle of intimates which too often transformed itself into a small 
circle of intriguers, before whom they allowed themselves to make 
remarks which were, to say the least, indiscreet, and criticisms 
which were malicious. The dauphiness fell into the way of join- 
ing in their discourse. Under their encouragement her natural 
turn for satire was given full play, under the impression that 
it would be confined within the narrow boundaries of a limited 
circle ; and her witty sayings, which were of course immediately 
repeated throughout the court and wickedly added to, hurt those 
against whom they were directed, and vexed the king. It is even 
asserted that she ridiculed the eccentricities of certain persons to 
their faces. 

Then on a sudden the young princess became timid, like her 
aunts, brusque, shy, notwithstanding the success she had enjoyed 

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THE MISCHIEVOUS MESDAMES. 55 

in the world. She no longer spoke to personages of distinction ; 
she dared not address the king; she no longer held the play in 
her apartment; she withdrew as much as possible from her duties 
of receiving, or when she was obliged to fulfil them she was fright- 
fully agitated. 

One day, it was on the 4th of September, 1770, the corps de 
ville of Paris and the States of Languedoc were to be presented 
to the dauphiness, the first by the Due de Chevreuse, governor of 
Paris, and the second by the Comte d'Eu, governor of the prov- 
ince. Mesdames, who were always awkward in their bearing 
whenever they had to appear in public, tried to persuade their 
niece to receive the addresses without replying to them, saying 
that they never did otherwise. Fortunately Mercy heard of it. 
He combated energetically the counsels of Mesdames. Marie 
Antoinette listened to him : she responded to the corps de ville 
and to the States with much grace ; the deputation and the public 
were enchanted with her. 

But the faithful ambassador was not always there to fight 
against the preponderating influence of the aunts. It was diffi- 
cult for him in his bi-weekly visits to correct the bad impression 
produced by daily conversation and example. The insinuations 
of the old princesses, falling incessantly on the mind of the young 
girl, ended by making an impression upon it, however strong the 
protest of her own good sense, as the constant dropping of water 
finishes by wearing away even the hardest rock. This deplorable 
ascendancy extended itself over everything, mingled with every- 
thing, touched everything. ** Mesdames are not content to gov- 
ern the dauphiness in all that relates to her personally," Mercy 
wrote ; " they also wish to extend their power over those persons 
attached to the service of her Royal Highness, to strike a blow at 
their prerogatives, to confound their ranks and thus lessen the 
very marked difference which should exist between the condition 
of the dauphiness and that of Mesdames of France." To confound 
the condition of the dauphiness and that of Mesdames of France, 
such was indeed at bottom the aim of the daughters of Louis XV. 

Despite everything, Marie Antoinette, led on by her want of 
calculation and need of expansion, which was one of the charac- 
teristics of her disposition, could not hide from her aunts either 
her joys or her hopes. One day, having received from the dau- 
phin a promise of intimacy which she had long expected and 
ardently hoped for, she could not keep her happiness to herself, 



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56 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

but ran to acquaint Madame Adelaide and Madame Sophie with it. 
They, being gossips, like all old maids, were not discreet enough 
to respect the confidence of the young wife ; they recounted it 
to so many persons that it became the news of the day. The 
dauphin, shy and displeased, failed to keep his engagement, and 
there was a coolness for some days in the household. 

Behind Madame Adelaide and directing her was her lady of the 
bedchamber, the Comtesse de Narbonne, a woman of small parts, 
according to Mercy, but well versed in intrigue, at a court where 
talent was not so necessary as cunning in order to succeed, and 
who had been able to gain great ascendancy over her mistress. 
Madame de Narbonne neglected nothing in order to attract the 
dauphiness and to obtain the same influence over her that she 
had over Madame Addalde. Either from indolence of mind or 
need of amusement and the facility of procuring it with the lady 
of the bedchamber, Marie Antoinette ended by submitting to her 
influence. We soon see a singular instance of this. 

When the archduchess left Vienna, her mother counselled her 
to obtain, as a special favour, for the Marquis de Durfort, who had 
negotiated her marriage, the title of duke. Several times in her 
letters to her daughter or in her correspondence with Mercy 
Maria Theresa, who had a talent for being grateful, returned to 
the subject, surprised that a favour so often granted to persons of 
much less merit than the Marquis de Durfort should be so long 
deferred. And yet it was to Marie Antoinette's interest to prove 
that she was willing to aid those who had served her, and that 
she had sufficient power to aid them effectually. But at every 
mention of the subject the young princess put off the question : it 
was necessary to wait, the opportunity was not favourable, etc. 
She had indeed spoken of it to Choiseul, but she dared not broach 
it to the king. The truth was that Madame Adelaide opposed 
having the Marquis de Durfort created duke because the glory of 
that title would in a manner redound to the credit of her younger 
sister, Madame Victoire, whose lady of the bedchamber was the 
Marquise de Durfort. This was also at the time when Mesdames 
Adelaide and Sophie were seeking to estrange the dauphiness 
from their sister, whose affectionate and more gentle nature 
threw them into the shade. 

Then there was a sudden change through one of those shiftings 
of scenes, or rather by one of those compromises, which we often 
see at court, but which are not entirely peculiar, so far as we know, 



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THE KING AND MARIE ANTOINETTE. S7 

to a monarchical form of government. The bishop of Gap, 
brother-in-law of the Comtesse de Narbonne, ardently desired to 
be made grand almoner to Madame Victoire; the Marquise de 
Durfort, who had as great ascendancy over her as the Comtesse 
de Narbonne over Madame Adelaide, persuaded her to refuse the 
nomination to the bishop so long as she herself had not received 
satisfaction. Madame Victoire yielded to her representations, 
and the two ladies of the bedchamber found themselves in the 
position of being mutually in need of each other. They capitu- 
lated, owing to the efforts of their common friends ; and it was 
agreed that the Comtesse de Narbonne should get Madame Ade- 
laide to speak to the dauphiness in behalf of the Marquis de Dur- 
fort, and that the latter should induce Madame Victoire to accept 
the bishop of Gap as grand almoner. This agreement was re- 
ligiously observed ; and the first result of it was that the bishop of 
Gap was called for and made grand almoner to Mesdames Victoire 
and Sophie. Immediately afterward Madame Adelaide having 
announced her consent that the dauphiness should use her 
good offices in favour of the Marquis de Durfort, her Royal 
Highness undertook the mission and spoke to the king concern- 
ing it on the 6th of that month. The king received the dau- 
phiness's petition graciously, and answered without the slightest 
hesitation that the request being a legitimate one, and the 
dauphiness desiring it, he gladly granted it ; he then commanded 
the Due de la Vrilli^re to send to the Marquis de Durfort an 
assurance in writing by means of which both he and his posterity 
should enjoy the dignity of duke and peer on the extinction, soon 
to take place, of the branch of Lorge ; this satisfied the demand 
of the Marquis de Durfort. 

Louis XV. sincerely loved the dauphiness ; her good-humour, 
^race, even her petulance, though sometimes audacious, pleased 
him. On several occasions his tenderness for her had been 
marked. One day, while out hunting, he got into her carriage 
and placed her affectionately upon his knee. 

Another time, at Fontainebleau, he went to her apartment in 
the morning in his dressing-gown, entering by a door hitherto 
locked, drank his coffee there and remained two hours, and 
seemed gayer and happier than usual. Tired of everything, sick 
of his culpable pleasures, it seemed as if he sought in that purer at- 
mosphere a refuge from himself; and it would have been easy for 
Marie Antoinette to accustom her grandfather to come regularly 



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S8 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

to her apartment, and to have thus gained an enduring dominion 
over that mind so easy to conquer by reason of its lassitude. It 
would only have been necessary for her to be herself and to yield 
to her j&rst impulse. 

Unfortunately Mesdames set themselves to work to inspire her 
with the same fear and taciturnity that they experienced in the 
presence of their father. Under their malign influence the young 
girl found herself embarrassed when with the king, and in her 
embarrassment remained silent. When she had a favour to ask, 
she preferred to write ; and Louis XV., who would not have dared 
refuse when brought face to face, being himself timid before his 
children, denied by letter what he would have granted to an oral 
request. Finding that she did not respond to his overtures, he 
ended by feeling hurt; he said nothing, because he was too indo- 
lent, but he vented his displeasure in fits of sullenness and cold- 
ness. Nor did matters improve. Mercy in vain represented to 
the dauphiness how easy it would be for her to profit by the 
friendly inclinations of her grandfather, who would like nothing 
better than to devote himself to his children provided that they 
on their part would try to lessen his ennui. The dauphiness ad- 
mitted it, but concluded by saying that she lacked the courage to 
talk to the king. *' I have believed it my duty to omit nothing," 
Mercy wrote in reporting this conversation to the empress, *' to 
the end that your Majesty might see to what degree the counsels 
of Madame Adelaide have enervated the dauphiness." 

Maria Theresa became alarmed at this persistent influence 
which had such fatal results for her daughter, and interfered with 
her own plans both as mother and sovereign. 

" Every letter informs me," she wrote, " that you are governed entirely 
by your aunts. I esteem them, I love them ; but they have never known 
how to make themselves either esteemed or loved by their family or the 
public, and you wish to follow in their footsteps ! " 

And then proudly drawing a parallel between what Mesdames 
were and what she was, she continued : — 

**Do my counsels, my affection, deserve a smaller return than theirs? 
I acknowledge that this thought cuts me to the heart Compare the part, 
the approbation, that they have received from the world and — I am loath 
to say it — the r61e that I have played. You should then give me the 
preference -if I prophesy or counsel differently from them. I do not wish 
to compare myself in any way with these estimable princesses, whose dis- 



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END OF MESDAMES' INFLUENCE. 59 

positions and good qualities I admire ; but I must ever repeat that they 
have not been able to gain the esteem of the public nor the love of indi- 
viduals. By reason of their «ey nature and the habit of being ruled by 
some one else, they have made themselves disliked, disagreeable, and 
wearisome, and the object of vexations intrigaes. I see you following the 
same course, and must say nothing 1 I love you too well to be able or 
willing to do so, and your affected silence on this point has distressed me 
and gives me little hope diat you will change 1 " 

There came a change, however. Little by little Marie Antoi- 
nette, enlightened by Mercy's warnings and her mother's scold- 
ing, came to value the counsels of her aunts more justly. She 
did not break with them at once; she could not brusquely sunder 
the ties which her age and her loneliness had led her to form, and 
which daily intercourse had strengthened. But her confidence in 
them was gone. 

Out of respect and habit she still paid some heed to the advice 
of her former counsellors; but from the middle of 1772 it is 
easy to perceive tliat the old princesses' influence was on the 
wane. If Marie Antoinette yielded to them now and then, it was 
rather from good-nature or fear than from conviction. 

Three months later Mercy acknowledges that they are no 
longer consulted about anything, not even regarding the minor 
arrangements of the day, of which formerly they were the arbi- 
ters. At the beginning of 1773 the relation of the dauphiness to 
her aunts is what it should be, — a simple observance of civilities ; 
she showed them the proper and fitting consideration, but she 
was no longer intimate with them. The sway of Mesdames was 
past. 

The old princesses did not bear cheerfully the loss of the small 
despotism which they had exercised over their niece and through 
her over the rest of the family. They manifested their displeasure 
in criticisms, cavilling, and sharp speeches, and in seeking to 
exalt, to the detriment of Marie Antoinette, their new sister-in- 
law, the Comtesse de Provence ; they were unsuccessful. Then, 
changing their tactics, they tried to ally themselves once more 
to Marie Antoinette; they made overtures to her, were obliging 
where they had before been dictatorial, and even besought the 
interposition of the Abb6 de Vermond. Balked in these efforts 
and kept at a distance by the conduct, wisely unmoved, of the 
dauphiness, they finished, after some moments of anger and a 
few sharp contests in which they did not come off best, by re- 

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60 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

signing themselves to the incontestable supremacy of their niece ; 
but they chafed under it, and their concentrated hate, constantly 
escaping, like a stream of poisonous mist, in cutting remarks and 
malicious insinuations, became a formidable danger to the daugh- 
ter of Maria Theresa. Their hands, unskilled in any great matter, 
but deft at petty intrigues, had a share in the weaving of every 
plot contrived against the young princess. Being no longer able 
to rule the dauphiness, they resolved to destroy the queen, and 
unfortunately succeeded. Their influence had been pernicious ; 
their spite was fatal. To cite only one instance, it was Madame 
Adelaide who inflicted the nickname of the " Austrian " on her 
niece, the unpopularity of which weighed on Marie Antoinette 
during her whole life, and after having brought her to the scaf- 
fold, rested upon her memory until history, better understood, 
meted out justice to the malice of old maids and the pamphlets 
of gazetteers. 



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CHAPTER VI. 

Disgrace of the Due de Choiseul; his Triumphant Exile; his 
Character. — Fall of the Parliaments. — Discontent of the 
People. — The Due d'Aiguillon. — The Comtesse du Barry. — 
The Proud Attitude of the Dauphiness toward the Favour- 
iTE. — The King is displeased by it. — Remonstrances from 
Maria Theresa. — Letter from Kaunitz to Mercy. — Direct 
Intervention of Louis XV. — Insistence on the Part of the 
Empress. — Lively Letters exchanged between Mother and 
Daughter. — Madame du Barry seeks to propitiate the Dau- 
phiness.; SHE fails. — In this Conflict, History shows Marie 
Antoinette to have been in the Right. 

ON the the 24th of December, 1770, the Due de Choiseul, 
prime minister of France, if not in title, at least in fact, 
received from the king the following note : — 

I order my cousin, the Due de Choiseul, to place his dismission from 
the office of Secretary of State and Superintendent of the Post, in the 
hands of the Due de la Vrillifere, and to withdraw to Chanteloup until fur- 
ther orders from me. Louis. 

Versailles, this 24th day of December, 1770. 

The duke learned of his disgrace with imperturbable coolness. 
He set out immediately for Paris, where he found the duchess, 
who had just seated herself at table. On seeing him enter, she 
said to him : " You have indeed the air of a man in exile ; but sit 
down ; our dinner will be none the less good." They dined in 
fact very tranquilly ; and on the following day the Due de Choiseul 
with his wife and his sister, the Duehesse de Gramont, departed 
for his estate in Touraine. A contemporary writes : " The people 
of Paris lined the streets from his palace to the D'Enfer boundary, 
overwhelming him with laudatory acclamations, which made such 
an impression on this minister, who had never been popular, that 
he exclaimed with tears in his eyes, ' This is something that I 
have not deserved.' " 



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62 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

His departure from Paris and from Versailles had been an 
ovation; his sojourn at Chanteloup was a triumph. Both the 
court and the city, as it was then said, betook itself thither ; 
there was hardly a great noble, a fashionable woman, or a man 
in office, who did not feel bound in honour to go to pay their 
respects to the exile, and the king, who at bottom perhaps 
missed his minister, shut his eyes to this striking protest, which 
was ill disguised under the pretence of paying homage to 
misfortune. 

Of a volatile mind, but broad and perspicacious, an inconsistent 
politician, but possessed of large views, witty, elegant, magnificent 
to prodigality, confident to presumption, bold to audacity, proud 
to haughtiness, a generous enemy, a devoted friend, regarded 
with favour by women, feared by diplomats, holding high the 
honour of France, the Due de Choiseul possessed great qualities 
and great defects, and perhaps it would be but true to say that 
he was more loved because of his defects than his qualities. Some 
one has written of him that he elevated " indiscretion into frank- 
ness, insolence to dignity, frivolity to independence." However 
unfortunate certain acts of his administration may have been, it is 
none the less certain that, in the midst of the enervated society of 
the reign of Louis XV., Choiseul was a character, and that he dis- 
played under various circumstances genuine talent as a statesman. 
In the full swing of the eighteenth century, at a time when the 
general opinion was one of praise for Frederick II., his foresight 
discerned the menace of that Prussian power which was still so 
young and yet so insidious ; and he found in the alliance with 
Austria the means to check its encroachments, the danger of which 
the future has but too plainly proved to us. 

He had gained such an ascendancy over foreign courts, espe- 
cially over that of Spain, that he said himself he was more sure of 
his power in the cabinet at Madrid than in the one at Versailles. 
But his very haughtiness left him without defence against the 
intrigues that were hatched against him. ** One never saw him," 
so writes a contemporary, ** stoop to vile court intrigues, nor to 
manage and flatter the valets." He despised his enemies from 
pride, and spared them from generosity. It was this that ruined 
him. His pride refused to bow the knee before the idol of the 
day, Madame du Barry. There resulted from this at first " petty 
dislikes, grimaces, sarcasms, shrugging of shoulders, and finally 
the petty vengeance of a schoolgirl." 



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CHOISEUL'S EXILE. 63 

Choiseul laughed at this, and his friends laughed with him. 
His position seemed secure ; the king esteemed and loved him. 
" You manage my affairs very well ; I am content with you," he 
had written to him. The marriage of the dauphin and the arrival 
T>f Marie Antoinette in France had served to strengthen the influ- 
ence of the minister. The favourite herself hgd no personal ani- 
mosity against him. ** She does not hate you in the least," Lx>uis 
XV. added ; " she recognizes your intelligence, and wishes you 
no ill." This letter from the royal lover, obviously dictated by his 
mistress, shows beyond doubt on her part a desire for a recon- 
ciliation. Choiseul, always haughty, repelled her advances; he 
contented himself with replying that he would grant all demands 
of Madame du Barry which he thought just. 

But he could not prevent those about him, nor refrain himself, 
from indulging in open and witty pleasantry on the subject of the 
favourite. He even ventured to make some bold remarks about 
her to the king. 

The king was hurt: he gave ear to the enemies of the min- 
ister. They represented that Choiseul was in league with the 
Parliaments, then struggling against the chancellor, and was seek- 
ing his own advantage in entangling France in a war between 
England and Spain. The Prince de Condd and Maupeou joined 
in the plot, and Madame du Barry threw the overpowering weight 
of her influence into the scales against him. 

Louis XV. yielded, and sent to the minister by the Due de la 
Vrilli^re the note which we have quoted above. Choiseul de- 
parted : one mistress had raised him up ; another overthrew him. 

Externally his fall changed nothing. Although he was the 
most determined upholder of the Austrian alliance among the 
members of the cabinet at Versailles, the king was not less in 
favour of it than he. According to the Comte de Broglie it was 
his favourite scheme, and he would not hear of abandoning it. 
But in reality his fall meant the triumph of the party opposed to 
Marie Antoinette. Maria Theresa, who had no fears for the alli- 
ance, was extremely uneasy for her daughter. Might they not 
try to remove from her her faithful counsellors, Mercy and Ver- 
mond? Might not the young princess, with her vivacity, which 
was little inclined to reflection, express too openly her sympathies 
with the fallen minister? Or, on the other hand, left to herself 
and lacking discretion, would she not be spoiled by that " abomi- 
nable set " ? These fears of the empress were vain ; guided by 



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64 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

Mercy, the young dauphiness behaved irreproachably in that 
delicate crisis ; but the danger was none the less real. 

The fall of the Parliament soon followed that of Choiseul. 
During the night of the 20th and 2ist of January, 1771, one hun- 
dred and sixty presidents or councillors were exiled; on the 
14th of April a bed of justice, solemnly held at Versailles, 
suppressed Parliament and replaced it by a new assembly com- 
posed for the most part of members of the Great Council. There 
was a great uproar in the whole kingdom ; at Paris as at Ver- 
sailles, every one openly took the part of the exiles ; the princes 
of the blood, with the exception of the Comte de la Marche, re- 
fused to assist at the bed of justice. Even the women took 
part in it ; and the public disregarded all bounds in its remarks. 
At the court the intrigues and the excitement were not less 
general. " It is impossible for your Majesty to form any exact 
idea of the horrible confusion that reigns here," Mercy wrote to 
Maria Theresa. " The throne is disgraced by the indecency and 
growing credit of the favourite and the wickedness of her par- 
tisans. The nation gives forth seditious speech and incendiary 
writings in which the person of the monarch is by no means 
spared. Versailles has become the abode of perfidy, hate, and 
vengeance; everything is done by intrigue and personal interest; 
and it would seem as though every one had renounced all senti- 
ment of honour." 

Choiseul was overthrown; and he was not replaced. The 
chiefs of the opposite party were divided upon the choice of his 
successor. The favourite desired the Due d'Aiguillon; the 
Prince de Cond6 was opposed to him; the chancellor was 
indifferent; and the king hesitated. D'Aiguillon had made him- 
self conspicuous by his long and violent contests with the Par- 
liament of Bretagne, in which he had not come off with his 
reputation for honesty and valour intact. This was calumny, but 
it spread none the less, and brought the protigi of Madame du 
Barry into discredit Louis XV. did not esteem him, and even 
felt for him a certain repugnance. " How can you imagine that 
he can replace you? " the king had written to Choiseul, the year 
before. " Hated as he is, what could he do ? " Yet the will of 
the favourite again triumphed over that of the king, and on the 
5th of June, 1 77 1, the Due d'Aiguillon was nominated. 

The absolute power of Madame du Barry was thus evident to 
all eyes ; and this open alliance between the prime minister and 



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THE DAUPHINESS AND THE FAVOURITE. 65 

the mistress became for Marie Antoinette the chief obstacle in 
her path over the slippery ground of the court of Versailles. 

This Comtesse du Barry was not at bottom, however, a bad- 
hearted woman. She was not vindictive, but she was vain, and 
all the more eager for consideration and honour in that she 
felt she did not deserve them. She had wished to be presented, 
and she had been by some women of the best society ; she had 
wished to sup with the dauphiness on her arrival, and her royal 
lover had had the cowardly weakness to permit her to sup with 
the dauphiness on the very eve of her marriage. From the 
moment she set foot in France Marie Antoinette had had before 
her, or rather beside her, this ** stupid and impertinent creature." 
She had found her at La Muette, and again at Marly, Choisy, 
Compiigne, Versailles, — everywhere. Her virginal purity re- 
volted against this impure contact, and she could not bring her- 
self to show the countess any mark of favour, or even to speak 
to her. The dauphin shared her repugnance, and did not hide 
it. For a while they sought to lure him to the little suppers at 
St. Hubert or at the Hermitage; he had soon, however, with- 
drawn from them, and on the advice of his wife. The favourite 
was vexed at this attitude of the young couple ; and her friends, 
having no further hope of the dauphiness, tried to destroy her 
credit by malicious insinuations, cutting criticisms, and clever 
lies. The king himself, under the instigations of his mistress, 
became angry ; but as he had a horror of all explanations with 
his children, he sent for the Comtesse de Noailles, and while 
doing justice to the character and grace of his granddaughter, 
complained that •* the dauphiness permitted herself to speak too 
freely concerning what she saw or thought she saw ; " and added 
that her rather hazardous remarks might excite bad blood within 
the family circle. 

This time Marie Antoinette was able to conquer her habitual 
timidity: she went to talk to her grandfather; and Louis XV., 
who dared not resist an appeal made in person or make any 
direct remonstrance, knew not how to maintain his displeasure. 
He assured his granddaughter that he found her charming, that 
he loved her with all his heart ; he kissed her hand, embraced 
her, and commended all that she had said to him. For this time 
the danger was dissipated, the cabal foiled ; and it would seem 
certain that if the young princess had triumphed over her em- 
barrassment and adopted the course of carrying affairs each 
VOL. I. — 5 

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66 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. * 

time before the king himself, she would soon have done with all 
annoyances. 

But it was at this very time that Mesdames, in order the better 
to influence their niece, were making strenuous efforts to estrange 
her from their father ; and this attitude, while alienating the old 
monarch, left the field free for all intrigues. Madame du Barry 
and the Due d'Aiguillon joined forces in their spite; and the 
king, caught between his minister and his mistress, — between the 
petty complaints respectfully submitted by the one and the bitter 
complaints of the other, — gave ear to their accusations. New 
insinuations were constantly made against the dauphiness, new 
assaults to shake her position. The Comtesse de Provence had 
just arrived at court ; the cabal surrounded her with attentions, and 
sought to make her growing credit a means of checkmating that 
of her sister-in-law. Savoy against Austria, — therein lay a per- 
sonal danger for Marie Antoinette; therein lay also political 
peril. Maria Theresa was alarmed ; and at her instigation, the 
Prince von Kaunitz wrote to Mercy a letter which the ambas- 
sador was authorized, or rather commanded, to lay before the 
young princess. 

" To be lacking in consideration for persons whom the king has honoured 
with office or with his society is to be lacking in consideration for himself. 
It would be still worse to permit oneself to make offensive remarks. One 
should regard that sort of person only from the point of view of an indi- 
vidual whom the king has found worthy of his confidence and favour, and 
one should not allow oneself to examine whether it be right or wrong ; the 
choice alone of the prince should be respected ; in consequence of this 
and out of respect for him, one should show consideration to that sort of 
person. Prudence demands that one should show it towards them because 
they can do harm." 

And the old diplomat finished by making a plan and almost by 
dictating the terms of the discourse which "Madame TArchi- 
duchesse " should hold with the king. 

But Kaunitz had to contend against both the influence of Mes- 
dames and the repugnance of the dauphiness. His counsel was 
not followed, and the intrigues continued. One day, on July 28, 
1771, at a supper given by the Comtesse de Valentinois, the Due 
d'Aiguillon took the Comte de Mercy aside and informed him 
that the king desired to speak with him on the day following the 
morrow at the house of his mistress. ** You know," the prince 
had said to his minister, ** that I am not lodged here in such a 



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THE KING IS DISPLEASED. 67 

way as to be able to see him at my ease. Therefore engage him 
to meet me at Madame du Barry's." Although somewhat sur- 
prised at this overture, which he thought but a pretext to get 
him to the house of the favourite, Mercy was careful not to miss 
the appointment on the 30th. He first encountered the countess, 
who, with many protestations of friendship, confided to him a 
cause for grievance, which she protested afflicted her deeply. 
Some one had had recourse to the most infamous calumnies to 
ruin her in the opinion of Madame la Dauphine ; they had even 
gone so far as to ascribe to her certain very disrespectful re- 
marks. Far from being guilty of any such enormity, she had 
.always been one of those who sang the merited praises of 
Madame TArchiduchesse, and had never used her credit with the 
king but to persuade him to grant the reasonable demands of 
the dauphiness ; and yet the princess always treated her with a 
sort of contempt Mercy, somewhat annoyed at these declara- 
tions, was professing ignorance, and treating as exaggerations 
these complaints of the countess, when Louis XV. himself arrived 
by a secret staircase. " Until now," he said, ** you have been 
the ambassador of the empress ; I now beg you to be my ambas- 
sador, at least for a time." Then in detail, but not without a 
certain embarrassment, he related his grievances against the 
dauphiness. He found her charming; but being young and 
lively, and having a husband who was not able to guide her, it 
was impossible for her to escape the traps that were set for her : 
she espoused the prejudices and enmities which were suggested 
to her; she ill-treated, even to affectation, persons whom he 
admitted to his intimate circle. Such conduct would occasion 
scenes at court and excite party spirit and intrigue. ** Go to see 
the dauphiness often," continued the king; "I authorize you to 
say to her whatever you wish as coming from me. She has bad 
counsellors; she need not follow their advice." And when 
Mercy observed that these remonstrances coming from the 
king himself would have greater weight with his granddaughter, 
who would certainly show an affectionate eagerness to obey 
him, the prince alleged his repugnance to having explanations 
with his children, and begged the ambassador to undertake this 
mission. ** You see what confidence I have in you," he added, 
"since I lay bare before you my thoughts concerning my 
family affairs." 

A strange and instructive picture I What is one to think of that 



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68 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

old monarch who had the regrettable courage to make himself the 
instrument of the caprices and spites of his mistress before his 
children, yet who did not dare avow it to them, and fell back 
upon the good-nature of a foreign minister to make known his 
wishes to his family? 

However, Mercy was too devoted to the dauphiness, and saw 
too clearly the intrigue which was being woven about her, not to 
warn her of it at once. He sought her on the 31st, recounted to 
her the scene of the preceding day, and insisted upon the neces- 
sity of promptly deciding upon her course of action. 

*' If Madame TArchiduchesse wishes to show openly by her conduct that 
she knows what role the Comtesse du Barry plays at court, her dignity re- 
quires that she should request the king to forbid the woman from appearing 
for the future in the court circle. If, on the contrary, she wishes to ignore 
the true position of the favourite, which is what Kaunitz advises, it is ne- 
cessary to treat her unaffectedly like any other lady who has been presented, 
and when occasion offers to speak to her, even if it be but once, which 
would put an end to all specious pretexts for complaints. It is not less 
urgent to speak to the king, and to complain gently of his having trans- 
mitted his wishes to his granddaughter by means of a third person, instead 
of communicating them to her himself Such a step would certainly em- 
barrass the prince ; and in order to avoid a similar dilemma in the future, 
he would be less ready to lend himself to the suggestions of the party in 
power. Moreover, it would be wise to consult the dauphin on this sub- 
ject, but under no circumstances to follow the advice of Mesdames." 

There was great commotion in the little circle of the dau- 
phiness at this news : the dauphin approved of Mercy's advice, 
but Mesdames protested ; and Marie Antoinette, who at that 
time blindly obeyed her aunts, despite the ambassador, and who, 
moreover, felt an extreme repugnance to the step which was re- 
quired of her, — Marie Antoinette did what, most people do in 
embarrassing situations : she adopted but part of the plan pro- 
posed to her; she consented to speak a word to Madame du 
Barry, but she obstinately refused to speak to the king. ** My 
aunts,** said she, ** do not wish it." 

The favourite was to come to court on August 11; it was 
decided that when they had finished at cards the ambassador 
should enter into conversation with her ; the dauphiness should 
approach and casually address a word to the countess. On the 
day appointed everything seemed destined to pass ofT as had 
been agreed upon. The young princess was somewhat fright- 



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MARIA THERESA'S REMONSTRANCES. 69 

— ^ — ■ 

ened, but determined. All went well at the beginning. After 
the games Mercy addressed Madame du Barry, and the dau- 
phiness began to make the round of the circle. She was just 
approaching the favourite when Madame Adelaide, who had not 
lost sight of her, raised her voice and said, ** It is time for us 
to retire. Come ; let us go and wait for the king in my sister 
Victoire's apartment." At this the dauphiness lost courage; 
she withdrew, confused, and the plan failed. The favourite was 
hurt ; Louis XV. was displeased ; impatient to know what recep- 
tion his mistress had met with, he came to inquire on leaving 
the council of state. " Well, Monsieur de Mercy," he said to 
the ambassador, "your scheme has not borne fruit; I must come 
to your aid." 

The ambassador was frightened at the evident ill-humour of 
the king ; he feared lest his resentment might lead him to some 
step disadvantageous to his children, and to prevent any outbreak 
he made a pressing appeal to the supreme authority, — to Maria 
Theresa. The empress, who until then. had never broached this 
delicate subject in her correspondence with her daughter, broke 
forth into severe reproaches : — 

" Confess that your embarrassment, your fear to say even good-day, or 
a word about a dress, or any other trifle, is nothing but affectation, pure 
affectation, or worse. You have allowed yourself to fall into such bondage 
that neither your reason nor your duty is strong enough to guide you. 
I cannot keep silent longer ; after your conversation with Mercy, and all 
that he told you the king desired, and which it was your duty to fulfil, 
that you should have dared to fail him I What good reason have you to 
give? None. You should not regard the Du Barry in any other light 
than as a lady admitted to the court and to the society of the king. You 
are his first subject ; you owe him obedience and submission ; you owe 
an example to the court, to the courtiers, who should execute the wishes 
of their master. If indignities or familiarities were exacted from you, 
neither I nor any one else would counsel you to grant them ; but an indif- 
ferent word, a little consideration, not for the lady, but for your grand- 
father, your master, your benefactor ! And yet you fail him on the first 
occasion that offers for you to oblige him and show him your affection, — 
an occasion which may not return again so soon. . . . You are afraid to 
speak to the king, and you are not afraid to disobey and disoblige him ! 
I think I shall release you for the present from any verbal explanation 
with him, but I demand that you should convince him by your conduct 
of your respect and of your tenderness by doing on every occasion what 
will please him ; and see that you leave nothing for him to desire on this 



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70 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

pointy no antagonism in example or discourse. Even should you embroil 
yourself with every one else, I cannot spare you this ; you have but one 
object, and that is to please and obey the will of the king ; if you conduct 
yourself thus, I shall release you for a certain time from the obligation of 
any verbal explanation with the king." 

It is difficult not to feel that this great consideration for the 
respect due to the royal majesty was somewhat strange under the 
circumstances, when the royal majesty was showing so little 
respect for itself. Under whatever paraphrases the thought was 
veiled, the whole tenor of it was this, — and Maria Theresa was 
ready to sacrifice a verbal explanation with the king to this press- 
ing necessity, — that she should speak to a woman whose presence 
at the court was a public scandal ; for to separate the mistress 
from the lady who had been presented was singularly subtle but 
scarcely practicable. However, if one word had sufficed, but 
no ! *' If you were in a position to see, as I do, all that occurs 
here," Marie Antoinette replied, "you would know that this 
woman and her set will never be content with a word, and that it 
will always be beginning again. I do not say that I shall never 
speak to her, but I cannot agree to speak to her at a given time 
in order that she may boast of it beforehand and triumph." 

Marie Antoinette was right. Madame du Barry had the auda- 
city and the passions of the class whence she was sprung. New 
instances repeatedly confirmed this. At the suppers in the little 
chclteau over which she presided, she had pushed her insolence 
so far as to try to sit beside the dauphin ; she sought to multi- 
ply her visits to the dauphiness ; she had a pavilion built which 
overlooked a garden hitherto reserved for the royal family ; she 
arrogated the right of disposing of all the offices in the house- 
holds of the princes. At the marriage of the Comte d'Artois 
she revived the scandal which had arisen at the marriage of the 
dauphiness; she dined in public with the royal family, and wore 
at this dinner gems worth five millions. She even went further: 
the Due d'Aiguillon, in concert with Madame Louise, whom one 
is astonished to find involved in this intrigue, sought to obtain 
from the Pope the annulment of the marriage of Madame du 
Barry in order that she might be in a position to marry the king ; 
she would have been a strange Maintenon to a strange Louis 
XIV. ** If the empress saw all that occurs here," Marie Antoi- 
nette said, "she would pardon me. No one would have the 
patience to stand it." 



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LETTERS BETWEEN MOTHER AND DAUGHTER. J\ 

But these very encroachments, this all-powerful ascendancy of 
the favourite, constituted in themselves a permanent peril. Ma- 
dame du Barry had too little intelligence and character to be dan- 
gerous in herself She was so by reason of those who surrounded 
her, whose remarks she repeated — it is Mercy who tells us — 
with the docility and cleverness of a parrot. Moreover, her van- 
ity led her to profit by any momentary advantage and by her 
incontestable empire over the feeble monarch. To make her 
resentment felt by some public demonstration, was this not to 
prove her power to all? Mercy feared the many despicable per- 
sons who, having nothing to hope for in the future, had no reason 
to respect anything in the present. He was afraid above all of the 
Due d'Aiguillon, who, he said, "shows himself more and more to 
be a slanderer who is to be feared." He did not cease to urge 
the dauphiness to adopt a more politic attitude toward the ruling 
party. His success was small; there was in the heart of the 
young princess a virginal revolt against anything that might seem 
like a mark of condescension toward that " creature." One day, 
however, on Jan. i, 1772, in passing before the favourite, she let 
fall a word which might seem to be addressed to her. Mercy 
triumphed, but his triumph was of short duration. "I have 
spoken once," Marie Antoinette said to him on the following day, 
" but I am determined to let it stop there ; and that woman shall 
not hear the sound of my voice again." 

To speak once to that woman whom she despised so supremely 
was an immense sacrifice, and it seemed to her that her mother 
and the ambassador should be satisfied. 

** I do not doubt," she wrote to Maria Theresa, " that Mercy 
has told you of my behaviour on New Year's Day, and I hope 
that you are content. You may be sure that I shall always sac- 
rifice my prejudices and repugnances so long as nothing conspic- 
uous and contrary to honour is proposed to me." 

The empress bounded beneath this lash. 

" You make me laugh when you imagine that I or my minister could 
ever give you any advice contrary to honour; nay, not even contrary to 
the least decorum. See by these tokens how much the prejudices and 
bad counsels of your friends have gained ascendancy over your mind. 
Your agitation after those few words, your remark that you will not say 
anything further, make me tremble for you. What interest should I have 
but your welfare and that of your position, the happiness of the dauphin 
and yours, the critical situation in which you and the whole kingdom are, 



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^2 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

the intrigues, the factions? Who can counsel you better or be more 
worthy of your confidence than my minister, who knows to the bottom the 
State and all the forces therein at work? . . . 

'* The king is old ; the indigestion from which he suffers is not insignifi- 
cant ; changes for good or evil may befall the Du Barry, the ministers. 
I repeat, my dear daughter, if you love me, follow my advice, which is, 
to follow without hesitancy and with confidence all that Mercy tells you 
or exacts of you. If he desires that you should repeat your attentions 
to the lady or to others, do it." 

If we seek an explanation of this extreme vivacity of language, 
we must turn to the circumstances for it. This letter was dated 
Feb. 13, 1772. This was the moment when that great crime, 
the first partition of Poland, was being negotiated by Prussia, 
Russia, and Austria. Maria Theresa, whose conscience revolted 
against this odious bargain, and who felt remorse for it during 
the remainder of her life, was seeking for the time to put a stop 
to it by the only means in her power; namely, by strengthening 
the Franco-Austrian alliance which had been somewhat weak- 
ened by the fall of Choiseul ; but D'Aiguillon refused to listen to 
the semi-mysterious overtures of Mercy, and there was not at that 
important moment any ambassador from France at Vienna. 
Finding her advances repelled and herself deserted by Versailles, 
the empress, in order not to be alone exposed to a war between 
Russia and Prussia, finished by taking part in the proposed com- 
bination, which, as she said, put a blot upon her whole reign ; and 
her son, Joseph II., who had not her scruples, accommodated 
himself very easily to an arrangement which added two provinces 
to his States. 

The affair once under way, however, it was important that 
nothing should interfere with it; could she rest easy with regard 
to France? Choiseul, indeed, was no longer there, — Choiseul, 
who under similar circumstances would have threatened to throw 
himself upon the Low Countries, and never would have con- 
sented to the partition. The new ambassador to Vienna, whom 
some ill-informed historians have tried to represent as a clever 
diplomat, the Prince de Rohan, scarcely interfered with Kaunitz, 
and contented himself with amusing the emperor with his conun- 
drums. D'Aiguillon, who was without genius, credit, or talent, and 
who had not been clever enough to understand at the first hint 
the overtures which Mercy had made him, seemed hardly capable 
of exciting any serious disquietude. What would happen, how- 



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MERCY AND THE DAUPHINESS. 73 

» ■ ' 

ever, if, resentful of the sorry r61e he had played at his d^but as 
minister, and vexed by the haughty reception accorded him by 
the dauphiness, he should unite his efforts with those of the 
favourite, who was equally annoyed, to thwart, out of vengeance, 
the projects of the court of Vienna? It was necessary above all 
to avoid any such danger; and the best means was for Marie 
Antoinette to consent to treat the minister and the favourite with 
more tact. 

** We know for certain," Maria Theresa wrote to Mercy, " that England 
and the king of Prussia are trying to win over the Du Barry. France is 
coquetting with Prussia. The king is feeble ; those around him do not 
give him a chance to reflect, nor to follow his own inclination. You see, 
therefore, how important it is for the preservation of the alliance that we 
use every means not to .come to any rupture at this critical moment. There 
is no one save my daughter who can prevent this misfortune ; she must 
cultivate the favour of the king by her assiduity and tenderness, and must 
treat the favourite well. I do not exact any familiarity, still less any inti- 
macy, but consideration for her grandfather and master, for the sake of the 
good which may come of.it to us and the two courts; the alliance may 
depend upon it." 

On receiving these urgent instructions, Mercy redoubled his 
attentions to the dominant party. At his instigation, Marie 
Antoinette, who knew nothing of the complications of European 
diplomacy, but who naturally feared above all else a rupture of 
the Franco-Austrian alliance, consented to address an insignifi- 
cant word to the countess ; but having once made this concession, 
she resumed her disdainful attitude. 

Mercy dwelt in vain upon the harm that might result to their 
affairs; in vain he pointed out that it was neither right nor 
decent for the royal family to seem by its bearing to criticise the 
conduct of the king; **that if the monarch was in the path of 
error, it was not for his children to call attention to the fact ; that 
the Holy Scriptures gave a very striking lesson on this subject in 
the malediction of the Lord on the sons of Noah who laughed 
at the drunkenness of their father, while God had blessed the 
children of the patriarch who covered him with their cloak." 

The dauphiness, for a moment moved, not by the theological 
reasoning of the ambassador, but by the wish to please her 
mother, even by sacrificing her very legitimate repugnances, 
soon returned to her original opposition, being encouraged 
therein, moreover, by her husband, who held Madame du Barry 
in abhorrence. 

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74 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

In vain the Due d'Aiguillon contrived new schemes with 
Madame de Narbonne to persuade Marie Antoinette to treat 
the favourite better; in vain Madame Addalde, who had become 
reconciled to the countess out of policy, sought to reconcile 
her tiiece to her. The influence of the old aunt was past, and 
the dauphin replied dryly to her hints, " I advise you, my aunt, 
not to meddle in the intrigues of Monsieur d'Aiguillon, for he 
is a bad fellow." When Madame du Barry presented to the 
dauphiness her niece, who had been recently married, she could 
not obtain a word either for her or for herself. Three months 
later she met with no better reception for her sister-in-law, the 
Comtesse d' Argicourt. Maria Theresa scolded ; but Marie An- 
toinette contented herself with replying that if she had acted 
otherwise the dauphin would have disapproved. And she added 
these words, which left her mother little hope of effecting a 
change, "When one has adopted a course of behaviour, one 
should not depart from it." 

The favourite, however, no longer complained. Mercy had 
made some observations to her one day on the present and 
future, and the advantage of managing the royal family, that had 
produced their effect. The future looked dark for Madame du 
Barry. Her dismissal had already been talked of. The king was 
growing old ; divers symptoms had warned him that infirmities 
had come with years ; he might recall to memory the faith he had 
known in his youth. The sudden death of some of his intimates, 
struck down almost before his eyes, had made a profound im- 
pression on" his frivolous mind. He began to discourse of his 
age, of the state of his health, of the awful account that each man 
must some day render unto God of the use he had made of his 
life. An intrigue skilfully conducted, and for which they had 
the wit to gain over Madame Louise, to oust the confessor of the 
king, the Abbd Maudoux, a pious and enlightened priest, who 
was at the same time Marie Antoinette's confessor, had failed, 
owing to the firmness of the young princess. Did all these con- 
siderations determine Madame du Barry to change her conduct 
toward her who was but dauphiness to-day, but who might be 
queen to-morrow? However that may be, from the beginning of 
the last months of 1773, we find the favourite employing unheard- 
of eff'orts to win over Marie Antoinette. Madame du Barry made 
incessant overtures to her ; she offered to get the king to recall 
the Comtesse de Gramont if the dauphiness would express a 



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MARIE ANTOINETTE JUSTIFIED. ?$ 

desire to have her do so. She even went so far as to propose 
to persuade the old monarch to buy her a magnificent pair of 
diamond ear-rings, estimated to be worth seven hundred thousand 
livres. Despite her love for gems, the dauphiness replied simply 
that she had no desire to increase the number she already pos- 
sessed. Beaten as enemy, repelled as ally, Madame du Barry 
adopted the only course proper for her, and the one she should 
never have departed from: she remained quiet and made no 
more complaints. 

This was the end and the proper solution, and the one, more- 
over, which it might have been easy to foretell, of that long and 
scandalous wrangle in which, in contempt of all order, natural 
and divine, a mistress, dragged from the mud, had held at bay 
during four years a princess of the royal blood, and wife to the 
heir of the crown of France, — a wrangle which had given occa- 
sion to so many annoyances at court, to so many legitimate 
revolts on the part of Marie Antoinette, to so many wise ma- 
noeuvres on the part of Mercy, to so many severe and unjust 
reprimands from Maria Theresa. For those who reason coldly, 
with that haughty indifference to the moral aspect of a ques- 
tion, and regard for material interest alone, which is one of the 
traditions of modern diplomacy, it is easy to understand the 
disquietude of the empress, her incessant recommendations, even 
her exactions; but it is more easy to comprehend — we would 
willingly say, to share — the virginal repugnance of Marie An- 
toinette. Perhaps the motives of the empress were more pru- 
dent; but those of the dauphiness were incontestably finer. 
One loves to feel that delicate fibre of wounded modesty vibrate 
in the heart of the young woman, and one contemplates with 
emotion that ** chastity of honour," as Burke says, which feared 
to soil the whiteness of its wings by any unworthy contact. 
Marie Antoinette comes out of the conflict nobler and purer. 
If politics condemn her, public honour absolves her. 



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CHAPTER VII. 

Popularity of the Dauphiness.— Traits of Kindness.— The Peasant 
OF AcHteES.— The Burning of the H6tel Dieu. — Entrance of 
THE Dauphin and Dauphiness into Paris.— The Universal En- 
thusiasm. — Letter from Marie Antoinette to her Mother. — 
Representations at the CoMfeoiE Fran^aise and at the CoMtom 
Italienne. — The Comte de Provence and the Comte d'Artois ; 
their Marriages ; their Relations with the Dauphiness. — 
The Amusements of the Young Couples. — Comedy in their 
Private Apartments. -— The Intimacy of the Dauphin and 
the Dauphiness. — The Dauphin becomes less Timid, the Dau- 
phiness more Thoughtful. — The Assured Position of Marie 
Antoinette at the Court in the Beginning of May, 1774. 

ALL these disputes, however, did not in any way lessen the 
popularity of the dauphiness. Apart from some courtiers 
whose fortunes were influenced by them, and some chroniclers 
whose gazettes were supported by them, the public concerned 
itself but little with these petty intrigues, woven within the. narrow 
limits of the royal palaces. It had been, as it were, bewildered 
by the fresh and gracious apparition which had traversed France 
from Strasburg to Versailles like a brilliant and kindly meteor ; 
it continued to believe in her brilliancy and her goodness. " The 
natural disposition of the French is to love their princes," the 
Mar^chal de Noailles wrote in 1753. The people did not distress 
themselves because that child of fifteen smiled at the antiquated 
mode of certain old dowagers, or broke certain rules of etiquette 
to the horror of Madame de Noailles. The people loved their 
dauphiness ; they saw only the fresh bloom of her cheek and her 
tenderness of heart Unfortunately they had only too little 
opportunity of observing them. Certain malicious jealousies had 
caused the postponement of the solemn entry of the young couple 
into the good city of Paris. But in the distance, where Marie 
Antoinette was kept, the public saw her ever charming, as on the 
day of her arrival, kind and sympathetic, as on the day she sent 



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POPULARITY OF THE DAUPHINESS. JJ 

all the money in her purse to those wounded on the Place Louis 
XV. ** Her youth," said Montbarrey, " her face, her figure, 
seduced all hearts and called forth enthusiasm." It would seem 
as if they hailed her as the bride of a whole people ; she was 
indeed — as a pamphleteer above suspicion wrote — " the idol of 
the nation/' France, who knew not where to bestow its tradi- 
tional love for its princes, gave it with both hands to the dauphin- 
ess. She was the bright beacon toward which all eyes turned, 
the fertile source whence sprang all the graces. It was incredible 
that any popular measure should be undertaken without originat- 
ing with her or passing through her hands. 

** Madame the Dauphiness is making herself adored here," 
wrote the impartial Mercy at the end of 1770; " and public opin- 
ion is so fixed on this point that some days ago on the occasion 
of a diminution of the price of bread the people of Paris said 
openly in the streets and markets that it was surely Madame the 
Dauphiness who had solicited and obtained this reduction for the 
benefit of the poor people." 

These charming traits, which sprang naturally from her heart 
and were carried by the thousand voices of fame abroad, sus- 
tained and augmented the popular enthusiasm. It was related 
that when the Due de Duras, gentleman of the bedchamber, 
proposed to the young princess to give some balls during her 
sojourn at Fofttainebleau, she replied that though it would be 
very agreeable to her to do so, the expenditures would thereby 
be increased, and she would not have it said that money could be 
found for her amusements and not for the salaries of the people 
in her service; and that therefore she should decline to con- 
sider his suggestion. They knew that she had used her influence 
in behalf of some soldiers who had been too severely punished. 
It was told that one day during a chase, the animal being brought 
to bay took to the river ; the hunters pressed forward to be in 
at the death, but in order to accomplish this it was necessary to 
traverse a field of wheat. The dauphiness ordered them to make 
a detour, preferring, she said, to miss the spectacle rather than 
occasion so much harm to the farmers, who were always ill 
indemnified for such losses. 

Another time during the chase, while passing over a bridge the 
postilion of her carriage fell, and four of the horses passed over 
his body ; they picked him up, bleeding and unconscious. The 
dauphiness immediately stopped and desired that the man's 



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78 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

wounds should be dressed before her. " My friend," she said to 
a page, with spontaneous vivacity, ** go for a doctor." " Run 
quickly for a litter," she said to another; " see if he speaks, if he 
is conscious." And she would not leave the place until she was 
assured that the wounded man would be well cared for and 
carried gently to Versailles, where she had him visited by her 
own surgeon. Both the court and the public were enraptured, 
and the one remark at Paris and at Versailles was that in this act 
Maria Theresa would have recognized her daughter, and Henry 
IV. his heir. 

The young princess exhibited the most charming considera- 
tion and exquisite delicacy for her attendants. One day the 
horse of her equerry kicked her on the foot ; she concealed her 
pain and continued her walk, although her foot was greatly 
swollen, in order to spare the man the chagrin of having been 
the involuntary author of the accident. Another day a lackey 
hurt himself in trying to move a piece of furniture too heavy for 
him ; she bathed the wound herself and made him a compress of 
her handkerchief. Another time she gave up her rides, although 
we know her passion for them, in order that her equerry might 
remain with his wife, who was ill. 

And it was not only to the persons in her service to whom she 
showed sympathy and consideration, but also to the poor and all 
who were unfortunate. A year after the incidents which we have 
just related, a groom of the Comtesse de Provence, in traversing 
the city of Compiigne, fell from his horse and was seriously hurt. 
The princess passed coldly on, without further concern for the 
accident ; but the dauphiness, who was following at a short dis- 
tance, stopped her carriage, gave orders that the wounded man 
should be cared for, and did not continue her way until she saw 
that her orders had been carried out. The public did not fail to 
compare the conduct of the two sisters-in-law, and one can 
imagine that the comparison was not to the advantage of the 
Comtesse de Provence. 

But her best-known deed, and the one which made the greatest 
sensation, was that which is known as the incident of Achires. 
It was at Fontainebleau, during the hunt again, on Oct l6, 1773. 
The deer, being at bay, took refuge in a small enclosure of the 
village of Achires. Finding no issue thence, and rendered furi- 
ous by his despair, he turned upon a peasant who was cultivating 
the enclosure, and gored him twice with his antlers, — once in the 



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BURNING OF THE h6tEL DIEU. 79 

thigh and once in the body. The man was thrown down, severely 
wounded. His wife^ wild with grief, flew toward the hunters 
and fell in a faint. The king, after giving orders that she should 
be looked after, withdrew. The dauphiness descended from her 
carriage, made the unfortunate woman inhale her salts, and after 
having brought her out of her faint, showered upon her money, 
consolation, and tears. She then made her get into her carriage 
and commanded that she should be taken to her house; nor did 
she rejoin the hunt until she had assured herself that the two 
invalids would receive the necessary attention. 

The entire court, moved by her noble example, hastened to aid 
the unfortunate ones. The dauphin emptied his purse into their 
hands; the Comtesse de Provence did the same. On the follow- 
ing days Marie Antoinette did not fail to send to inquire after 
the wounded man, whose condition had at first seemed criti- 
cal, but who recovered, nevertheless, thanks to the care which 
the surgeons of the court, on the order of the young princess, 
bestowed upon him. The public, on learning these details, and 
delighted with the tears of sympathy which the dauphiness had 
shed, was inexhaustible in its praises of her; there was but one 
cry of admiration for her. At Fontainebleau the people crowded 
together wherever there was a chance of seeing her. At Marly, 
at Versailles, they greeted her with such enthusiasm and accla- 
mation when she went out as almost to frighten her. The papers 
of the time were full of verses in her honour, and one witty 
woman, the Princesse de Beauvau. originated this saying, which 
was too much in the taste of the day not to be popular, " Ma- 
dame the Dauphiness follows nature, and Monsieur the Dauphin 
follows Madame the Dauphiness." 

We might multiply indefinitely these instances, which abound 
in the memoirs of her contemporaries and the reports of Mercy. 
We will cite but one more. During the night of the 29th and 
30th of December, 1772, a frightful fire broke out in the H6tel 
Dieu at Paris. The fire, after having smouldered in the cellars, 
burst forth toward one o'clock in the morning with such violence 
that the light was visible as far as the outskirts of the city. De- 
spite the promptitude with which aid arrived, despite the activity 
of the fire department, which had been recently organized, and 
the devotion of workers at whose head were the archbishop of 
Paris, Monseigneur de Beaumont, the principal magistrates, and 
the priests of the city, the majority of the buildings were destroyed ; 



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8o LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

the loss was valued at two millions. Ten of the sick were burned 
to death; the others were carried in haste to the archbishop's 
palace, to Notre Dame and to the churches ; and several of those 
who had run to their aid perished in the flames or were wounded. 

Seized with consternation at this frightful disaster, the arch- 
bishop of Paris made a warm appeal to public charity and or- 
dered collections to be taken. When Marie Antoinette was 
informed of it, she hastened to send a thousand 6cus, and with a 
modesty which does her even greater honour than her compas- 
sion, took the most minute precautions that no one should know 
of it, pushing the mystery so far as to say nothing of it to Mercy 
or to Vermond. 

Despite this, the secret leaked out ; and the public was the more 
grateful to the young princess for her generous charity since the 
initiative had come from her, and no one of the royal family had 
set her the example. But such compliments were embarrassing 
to her modesty, and she sought to escape them. 

When, therefore, on June 8, 1773, Marie Antoinette, preceded 
by these memories and bearing on her forehead the aureole of 
all her hopes, finally made her entrance into the capital, the en- 
thusiasm of the Parisians was indescribable. It was customary 
to have this ceremony of the entrance of the dauphin follow 
shortly after the celebration of the marriage ; but the cabal, which 
feared the popularity of the young princess and desired not to 
have it increased by the glory of a public triumph, had suc- 
ceeded in awakening the distrustful susceptibility of the old mon- 
arch, who for a long time had become unused to acclamations. 
Docile to the suggestions of his mistress and his minister, Louis 
XV. had always put off the official ceremony, and Marie Antoi- 
nette, despite her ardent desire, had never had the pleasure of 
seeing Paris and of being seen there; she had not even been 
able, as she one day planned, to drive through the boulevards. 
Finally, in the month of May, 1773, she decided to speak to the 
king of her desire; and this prince, who could never refuse any- 
thing to her face, replied that he demanded nothing better, and 
that she was free to choose the day that would suit her. The 
date was fixed for the 8th of June ; the preparations were pushed 
with vigour, and the ceremony was magnificent. Nothing like it 
had been seen for a long time. The people of Paris were eager 
to see their young princess, whose grace and virtues were cele- 
brated by fame, and whom they did not yet know. At the Gate 



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THE ENTRANCE INTO PARIS. 8 1 

of the Conference the couple were received by the Due de Brissac, 
governor of Paris, the lieutenant of police, Monsieur de Sartines, 
the corps de ville, and the provost of the merchants. There, 
while they were being presented with the keys of the good city 
on a silver platter, the women of the halles offered them the first 
products of the market, flowers and fruits. The august couple 
with their suite then entered state coaches and traversed the 
Quai des Tuileries, the Pont Royal, the Quai Conti, where the 
provost of the mint had ranged his company of cavalry, the Pont 
Neuf, where the lieutenant of the prison awaited them at the foot 
of the statue of Henry IV., with the guards de robe courte^ passed 
along the Quai des Orfevres, the Rue St. Louis, passing before 
the H6tel Dieu, where the mother prioress stood with her nuns, 
and arrived at Notre Dame. The dauphin and dauphiness were 
met at the door by the archbishop and the chapter, and went to 
kneel in the choir, and thence to the chapel of the Holy Virgin, 
where the chaplain of the king celebrated low mass while the 
choir sang a motet. After mass they visited the treasury, then 
went to Ste. Genevieve, making the tour of the shrine of the 
saint, and finally returned to the Tuileries. At the College of 
Louis le Grand, the rector of the university, at the head of the 
four faculties, addressed them; at the College Montaigu the 
students recited verses to them. 

These were the official ceremonies, but what was not on the 
progjramme was the truly extraordinary enthusiasm of the public ; 
along the entire route of their progress the crowd was so com- 
pact that it was almost impossible for the carriage to advance. 
Everywhere were decorations, triumphal arches, pavements 
strewn with flowers, everywhere frantic vivats. The dauphin- 
ess had a smile for each, a bow for persons of distinction, a 
beaming countenance for all. " It is impossible," Mercy 
wrote, "to show more grace, more charm, and more presence 
of mind than Madame the Archduchess has displayed at this 
juncture." Her smile went to the heart. Hands were clapped, 
handkerchiefs waved, hats thrown into the air; there was uni- 
versal delight. With her habitual kindness, the young princess 
ordered her guards to allow every one to approach ; it seemed 
as if for that day the ancient etiquette had been abolished. At 
the Tuileries the women of the halles dined in the concert-hall ; 
palace and garden were both full of people. When the dauphin- 
ess appeared on the balcony she could not help exclaiming, 
VOL. I.— 6 



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82 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

frightened by the sea of humanity, " Heavens, what a crowd ! " 
** Madame," replied the Due de Brissac, gallantly, " without wish- 
ing to displease Monsieur the Dauphin, here are two hundred 
thousand people who are in love with you." 

But- the dauphin was not jealous ; he was happy. The enthu- 
siasm of the crowd, the charm of his companion, reacted upon 
him, and conquering his natural timidity, he responded with ease 
to the speeches which were addressed to him. His habitual 
coldness was, as it were, warmed by the reflection of the grace 
of his young wife; and the populace, remarking with pleasure the 
unexpected transformation, ascribed the honour of it to the dau- 
phiness. ** How beautiful she is ! How charming she is ! " were 
heard on every side. 

After the dinner in public the couple, arm in arm, descended 
into the garden of the Tuileries, where they walked. Fifty thou- 
sand persons were gathered in the allies, on the benches, on the 
balustrades, even in the trees. The masses were so compact that 
the royal couple remained for nearly three quarters of an hour 
unable to advance or to retreat; for a moment even they were 
separated from their suite. But this eagerness delighted them 
both ; they felt themselves in safety in the midst of their people, 
enjoyed their delight, listened with emotion to the acclamations, 
naively enthusiastic, which escaped from all hearts ; and the only 
order which the dauphiness gave to her guards was not to turn 
away any one, and to allow every one who wished to approach. 

When, after this delightful walk and before their departure, 
the two princes ascended to the chateau to contemplate for the 
last time the spectacle, and remained during half an hour on the 
terrace, despite the rays of a hot sun, saluting with their hands to 
the right and left the crowd that pressed about the base of the 
Tuileries, there rose from the assemblage but one universal cry 
of joy and delight Some one had said that France had felt for 
Louis XV. the affection of both mother and mistress ; it seemed 
on that 8th of June, 1773, as though the capital had bestowed 
some of that tenderness upon Marie Antoinette. 

As for the dauphiness, she could hardly restrain the tears of 
happiness which filled her eyes. " Ah, these good people ! " she 
repeated again and again. 

" I had on Tuesday last," she wrote a few days later to her mother, 
" an experience which I shall never forget. We made our entrance into 
Paris. As for honours, we received more than you can imagine ; but this, 



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THE COMEDIE FRAN^AISE. 83 

though deb'ghtfuly was not what touched me most : 't was the tenderness 
and eagerness of those poor people, who, despite the taxes with which 
they are burdened, were transported with joy to see us. When we went 
to walk in the Tuileries, there was such a crowd that for three quarters of 
an hour we could neither advance nor retreat Monsieur the Dauphin 
and I ordered the guards several times not to strike any one, which pro- 
duced a very good effect There was such good order during the day 
that, despite the enormous mob which followed us everywhere, no one 
was hurt. On our return from our walk we ascended to the open terrace 
and remained there for half an hour. I cannot tell you, my dear mamma, 
what transports of joy, of affection, were manifested toward us during that 
time. Before withdrawing we waved our hands to the people, which gave 
great pleasure. How happy ought one in our position to be, to be able 
to gain the friendship of a whole people so cheaply ! Yet there is nothing 
more precious ; I have felt it, and I shall never forget it" 

Louis XV. awaited at Versailles with some impatience the re- 
turn of his grandchildren. ** My children," he said to them when 
they returned, " I was almost uneasy. You must be very fatigued 
with your day." '* It has been the sweetest of my life," replied 
the dauphiness ; and associating with a delicate flattery the name 
of the king and those of his children who had just been the object 
of this popular demonstration, " You must be exceedingly beloved 
by the Parisians," she said to the old monarch, ** for they have 
treated us very well." 

Delighted with this enthusiastic reception, the young princess 
had but one desire: to return often to that city which had 
greeted her with such acclamation. She obtained permission 
from the king to return thither every week to the play ; at first 
with all the equipage of royalty, to the sound of cannon from 
the Bastille and Invalides, with a great display of French and 
Swiss guards round the theatre and even on the stage; soon, 
however, with the greatest simplicity, in a simple dress and with 
a small suite. Whether her visits were ceremonious or private, 
the success of them was the same. "A volume might be writ- 
ten," Mercy said, " of all the affectionate sayings and remarks 
concerning the figure, the grace, the air of affability and kindness 
of Madame the Archduchess." One day, — it was on June 23, — at 
the Com^die Fran^aise, the " Siege of Calais " was given. In the 
third act, where Mademoiselle Vestris spoke the two lines. 



" The French in their prince love to find a brother, 
Who, bom son of the State, becomes its father," 

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84 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

she turned toward the dauphin ; the entire audience applauded 
with transport. 

A little farther on, when tliis passage was recited, 

" What a lesson for you, superb potentate ! 
Oh, keep watch o*er your subjects of lowest estate, 
Lest far from your gaze one from misery dies 
Who one day your empire had saved," 

it was the dauphin and dauphiness who applauded in their turn, 
and this exhibition of feeling was received with new transports of 
tenderness and gratitude. 

Another day, at the Com^die Italienne, the " Deserter " was 
given. The refrain of a couplet was " Long live the king." The 
dauphiness applauded. The refrain was repeated. The actor 
Clairval added, "And his dear children." The entire parterre 
joined with the actors in clapping their hands, and the entertain- 
ment ended with the singing of five couplets improvised in 
honour of the young couple. 

At each visit — to the Ste. Ovide fair, to the salon, where 
the dauphin stopped before the picture by Marchy which repre- 
sented him walking in the garden of the Tuileries with his wife 
on his arm, in the garden of Marichal de Biron — there was the 
same enthusiasm, the same acclamations; and when the court 
departed for Compi^gne, it was not without regret that Marie 
Antoinette left the good city of Paris. 

Despite the pains which were taken to arouse his jealousy, 
Louis XV. enjoyed this brilliant triumph of his grandchildren. 
Mesdames, it is true, took umbrage at it ; and the cabal redoubled 
its hate and rage, but it spent itself in vain efforts. The entrance 
of the Comte and Comtesse de Provence, to which they tried to 
give royal magnificence to counterbalance the impression pro- 
duced by that of the dauphin, but ended in miserable failure. 
The pomp and circumstance left the public indifferent. The 
Comte and Comtesse de Provence were completely eclipsed by 
the dauphiness ; it was of her alone the public talked ; it was she 
alone whom they wished to see. 

We may think that, surrounded by this bright armour of 
popular sympathy, the dauphiness had no need to fear the in- 
trigues of the palace and the rivalries of the court. The Comte 
de Provence, who was forty years later to inaugurate the consti- 
tutional regime in France, and to bind with so wise a hand the 



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THE COMTE DE PROVENCE. 85 

wounds given to the country by the Revolution and the Empire, 
had not then shown the qualities which he displayed upon the 
throne. A year younger than the dauphin, he had from his 
infancy possessed a precocious ambition, a serious disposition, 
but one that was also distrustful and inclined to intrigue ; of a 
subtle and cultivated mind, possessing a taste both for letters and 
politics, highly valued by those around him, and usually to the 
disparagement of his older brother, he scarcely dissimulated his 
resentment at being in the second rank when he believed himself 
fitted by nature for the first. With such aspirations an(^ senti- 
ments he would seem to be an instrument ready made to the 
hands of the cabal hostile to Marie Antoinette. They tried to 
make him pose as a rival to his brother, particularly when his 
marriage to a princess of Savoy had assured his position at 
court; they affected on that occasion to establish his household 
on a scale equal to that of the dauphin. His wife, who was 
without intelligence or grace and Italian in character, lent her- 
self readily to these petty and malicious attempts. On several 
occasions Marie Antoinette had to complain of the attitude of the 
young couple toward her. Then came a complete change of base. 
Was it a recognition of their impotence in face of the growing 
popularity of the dauphiness? Was it regret that he had been 
led by the Due de la Vauguyon? Or was it simply a change of 
front in a plan perseveringly ambitious } However that may be, 
after the death of his governor, the young prince sought a recon- 
ciliation with his sister-in-law, avowed to her that he had been 
wrong, and laid the whole blame upon Monsieur de la Vauguyon. 
Marie Antoinette, who was sweet-tempered and harboured no 
rancour, was only too willing to forget annoyances ; their rela- 
tions were promptly established upon a footing of intimacy. 
Each morning the Comte de Provence came to the apartment 
of the dauphiness to bring her the news of the court, the songs 
and dons-mots of the day; he contrived with her schemes for 
their amusement, laid before her his plans of conduct, and pro- 
posed that they should form a party at the court. Always con- 
fiding and without calculation, Marie Antoinette gave herself up 
to the charm of an intimacy which, thanks to the wise counsels 
of Mercy, was productive of pleasure but of no inconvenience ; 
the need of society, the desire to escape from the despotism of 
Mesdames, the attraction of his witty conversation, disposed her 
toward this friendship. But discovering one day an understand- 



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86 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

ing between her brother-in-law and the Due d'AiguiUon, she felt 
that the young prince was not perfectly candid in his behaviour. 
From that time she was on her guard ; the visits of the Comte 
de Provence became less frequent; and their relations, while 
remaining friendly, ceased to be confidential. 

The second brother of the dauphin, the Comte d'Artois, was 
by no means so ambitious. With a charming face, a good fig- 
ure, lively and easy manners, skilful in all bodily exercises, brave 
and gallant as a Bourbon, the only prince of the royal family 
with any pretensions to elegance in the eyes of his contempo- 
raries, he occupied himself less with business than with pleasure ; 
he did not desire to rule, but to amuse and be amused. His 
character was the exact opposite of that of the Comte de Pro- 
vence. Where the one was cold and designing, leaving nothing 
to chance, the other was gay and open, amiable and enthusiastic, 
but vain and frivolous, heedless in his remarks, inconsequent in 
his behaviour. He plagued the ministers, defied opinion, listened 
to no one, and often drew upon himself the displeasure and re- 
monstrances of his older brother. The dauphiness affected not 
to take him seriously, and to turn into jest whatever he did or 
said that was unreasonable. This conduct, while it mortified the 
young prince, impressed him; but it is easy to see that this 
impression would not last long, and that the day would come 
when the society of that brother-in-law, who was witty and agree- 
able, but hot-headed, turbulent, and "bold to excess," might 
become a peril. 

As for the Comtesse d'Artois, ill-favoured by nature, small, 
with a poor figure, a very long nose, badly set eyes, a large 
mouth, and irregular features, not less ill-favoured in the matter 
of wit and talent, insignificant, and little loved by her husband, 
she could not possibly rival Marie Antoinette, although the cabal 
for a moment aided by the minister of Sardinia, the Comte de la 
Marmora, tried to oppose the two Piedmont sisters to the Austrian 
archduchess. 

But Marie Antoinette was not jealous. Strong in her superi- 
ority, and guided by the inspiration of her heart, she was not 
disturbed by these machinations, which could not touch her, and 
was only concerned to establish harmony in the royal family. 
She was successful in this delicate enterprise. Without forming 
any party, as the Comte de Provence had suggested, which would 
not have been without danger, the young couples formed a circle. 



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INTIMACY OF DAUPHIN AND DAUPHINESS. 87 

They organized diversions together; they gave balls, parties, 
family suppers; they went together to the balls at the opera. 
They did more : they played comedy. In one of the rooms of 
the entresol at Versailles where no one ever went, they arranged 
a stage from which the divers characters might appear and dis- 
appear into an armoire. They resolved to learn to play the best 
pieces in the French repertoire. The three princesses, the Comte 
de Provence, and the Comte d'Artois were the actors ; Monsieur 
Campan was the manager of this little impromptu troupe ; the dau- 
phin was the audience. The Comte de Provence knew his rdles 
without mistake ; the Comte d'Artois repeated his with grace, the 
dauphiness with intelligence ; the other princesses played badly. 
From time to time one heard the loud laugh of the dauphin greet- 
ing the entrance of the actors on the stage. This lasted for some 
time. They amused themselves greatly; the very mystery which 
surrounded the royal troupe gave a more piquant flavour to the 
forbidden fruit. Unfortunately, one day Monsieur Campan, 
already in costume, went in search of something he had left in 
his dressing-room, and ran across a valet of the wardrobe. The 
secret was discovered; they were afraid it might be betrayed. 
What would the king, what would Mesdames have said to these 
amusements which were worthy of school-children on a holiday? 
They feared their reproaches, and gave up a diversion which had 
made a little variety in the monotony of the court, and for which 
the dauphin himself had acquired a veritable liking. 

The intimacy, however, of the young married couple increased 
day by day. The dauphin was falling under the charm of his 
young wife; and she on her side was beginning to appreciate his 
solid qualities, his loyalty, and the genuine tenderness which lay 
beneath his rough exterior. Despite the wit of the Comte de 
Provence and the elegance of the Comte d'Artois, she did not 
hesitate to acknowledge that for the stability of their relation, 
her husband was greatly their superior. One day, irritated by 
the indirect methods of the Comte de Provence, and hurt by the 
frivolities of the Comte d'Artois, she threw herself into the arms 
of the dauphin, exclaiming, *• I feel, my dear husband, that I love 
you more and more every day. Your upright character and 
frankness charm me ; the more I compare you with others, the 
more I appreciate your worth." 

There were undoubtedly many things in the young prince 
which left much to be desired, even traits which sometimes 



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88 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

shocked the feminine delicacy, the innate distinction of Marie 
Antoinette. It would have been difficult, perhaps, to meet two 
characters offering greater contrast than those of the two young 
people. It was vivacity united to coldness, expansiveness to 
taciturnity, the incarnation of grace to a sort of native inelegance; 
in a word, if I may express myself thus, it was a polished diamond 
by the side of a rough diamond. The dauphin had certain tastes 
which ill accorded with the great elegance of his wife; being 
passionately devoted to the chase, violent exercise, manual 
labour, he pursued them with an immoderate ardour which un- 
dermined his health, and made him contract an air of negligence 
and roughness which is always displeasing in a future sovereign, 
and was especially displeasing at the court of Versailles, which 
at that time set the fashion for all Europe. The dauphiness real- 
ized this; she reproached her husband for his slovenliness with 
perhaps too great warmth; the dauphin was at first provoked, 
and then began to cry. His young wife was touched ; she mingled 
her tears with those of her husband, and the reconciliation was 
very tender. The Comtesse de Provence, who witnessed this 
scene, demanded in jest if the peace were made, and the dauphin 
replied gallantly that " quarrels between lovers were never of 
long duration." Under the influence of this gracious Egeria an 
improvement manifested itself in the manners of the young 
prince. This " matter in the rough," as Joseph II. called him, 
began to yield up its treasures. The dauphin tried to conquer 
his timidity. He talked more, was easier in public, took greater 
interest in dancing and in the amusements of society, besides 
giving more time to serious occupations, and in particular to read- 
ing; for this young woman who had been so often reproached 
for not devoting herself sufficiently to intellectual occupations, 
was the first to encourage her husband to study. She rejoiced 
in his progress silently, taking no credit to herself for it, and was 
only eager to show it off; but the public ascribed the honour of 
it to her, and the young prince showed his gratitude on every 
occasion. ** I must acknowledge," he said to her one day, " that 
you always advise me well." " Do you love me? " he asked her 
another time. "Yes," replied the princess, with spontaneous 
frankness, " and you cannot doubt it ; I love you sincerely, and 
I esteem you even more." The dauphin was touched by this 
naive avowal ; he became tender and almost gallant toward his 
wife. His confidence in her increased day by day, and he showed 



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THE DAUPHINESS MORE THOUGHTFUL. 89 

her on every occasion a condescension without limit '* His def- 
erence to Madame the Archduchess," Mercy wrote, scarcely 
three weeks before the death of Louis XV., ** proves how much 
importance he attaches to her advice, and one sees that his grati- 
tude binds him more and more to his august wife." 

At this date Marie Antoinette's position was so secure that 
nothing seemed able to shake it For a year, and particularly 
since her triumphant entrance into Paris, her power had con- 
stantly increased. The cabal, which had tried to undermine it, 
had been obliged to acknowledge itself defeated. Mesdames, after 
the first moment of anger, had resigned themselves, in appear- 
ance at least, to see in the dauphiness the future mistress of the 
State. The Comte and Comtesse de Provence studied but to 
please her; the Due d'Aiguillon silenced his rancour and sought 
occasions to be agjreeable to her ; the comptroller-general took 
her orders ; the favourite herself made overtures ; and all those at 
court who took thought for their future saw that their only course 
was to seek security in the friendship and good-will of the dau- 
phiness. She disarmed all jealousies and defeated all intrigues. 

As for her success with the public, it was too brilliant, and we 
have described it at too great length above to refer to it here. 

But what it is important to note, because it has been contested, 
is that Marie Antoinette owed this success to herself and to the 
development of her good qualities. Whatever one may say, and 
despite the relapses inevitable at her age, she had during those 
four years made sincere efforts to correct the faults which her 
mother and the Comte de Mercy had signalized to her with such 
persevering vigilance. 

*• I shall not fall into more errors than I can help," she said one 
day; **when it does happen, however, that I am guilty of any, I 
shall acknowledge them." She kept her word, and in many ways 
succeeded in doing better. The lively, heedless, somewhat wilful 
child who had crossed the Rhine on the 7th of May, 1770, had 
grown to be a self-possessed young woman, somewhat ardent 
perhaps at times, and always frank and naTve, but no longer fol-' 
lowing her first impulse, calculating better the import of her 
words and actions, and adding to the attraction of her naturalness 
and openness of heart the more durable ch^irm of a consistent 
behaviour and thoughtful attitude. It was with legitimate pride 
that she could say to her faithful counsellor one day, " Acknowl- 
edge that I have reformed in many ways," which he could not 

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90 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

She tried sincerely to interest and apply her mind, formerly 
careless and inattentive, to serious subjects. Her intelligence, 
which was marvellously quick to understand affairs, but which 
hated them extremely, began to lend itself somewhat more to 
the complications of politics, while her piety remained intact and 
pure under the enlightened direction of a virtuous and modest 
priest, the Abb6 Maudoux. Possessed of judgment which was 
always clear when free from foreign influences, perspicacity which 
often put Mercy to rout, wonderful sagacity in judging men and 
things, her eminent qualities seemed to assure a brilliant future 
and irresistible empire to the dauphiness, if she could but conquer 
the remnant of her timidity, her too great love of pleasure, and, 
above all, resist the importunities and insinuations of those around 
her. And this promise of power lent a new charm to the arts in 
which she excelled, — that of receiving at court, of presiding over 
the circle, of saying an amiable word to every one ; to her innate 
kindliness, now enhanced by a serene dignity and self-composure, 
the result of her maturer age. 

All those who had known her from her infancy and who saw 
her at the end of 1773 or at the beginning of the year 1774, 
which was to be so decisive for her, — the Baron de Neny, Field- 
Marshal Lascy, — were struck by this happy transformation. 
Mercy wrote, " With regard to the instincts of her character and 
judgment Madame the Dauphiness is so fortunately gifted that it 
is morally impossible she should ever fall into an error of any 
consequence, either in the present or future." 

And Maria Theresa herself, who was so severe to her daughter, 
severe sometimes even to injustice, could not help replying to 
her faithful ambassador, on April 5, 1774, '* I am reassured by 
the news which you send me of the behaviour of my daughter." 

And it is thus that Marie Antoinette, surrounded by intrigues 
and cabals, but with no longer any cause to fear them, beloved 
by the public, envied but respected at court, dominating all by 
the superiority of her rank, eclipsing all by the brilliancy of her 
personal qualities, — that Marie Antoinette, smiling and gay, ad- 
vanced confidently and with a firm step toward the hour when 
the dauphiness was to become the queen of France. 



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CHAPTER VIII. 

Death of Louis XV. 

ON Wednesday, the 22d of April, 1774, at Trianon, Louis XV. 
was seized with a sudden chill, which was followed by a 
fever and violent headache ; on the 28th he decided to return to 
Versailles ; on the 29th he was bled twice ; during the night of the 
29th and 30th all the worst symptoms of small-pox declared 
themselves. The disease was of so dangerous a nature that the 
very air of the p^ace seemed to be infected ; fifty persons caught 
it from simply traversing the galleries at Versailles; ten died of 
It; and the Marquis de Letoriire, who had opened the door of the 
royal bedchamber only for two minutes, was struck down and 
died in a few hours. 

From the beginning of his illness Mesdames, with admirable 
devotion and despite the strongest expostulations, did not hesi- 
tate to brave contagion, and shut themselves up with their father, 
remaining day and night by his bedside and beneath the very 
curtains. Marie Antoinette wished to do the same; the old 
monarch would not permit it, and forbade all communication 
between himself and the young royal couple, who retired into the 
most complete isolation, the dauphin refusing to give any order 
and even to speak to the ministers so long as his grandfather 
lived- 

Startling intrigues were carried on round the bed of the sick 
man. The parties Barrien and Anti-Barrien, Aiguilloniste and 
Anti-Aiguilloniste, engaged in a furious battle, whose prize was 
the soul of this poor prince. Unheard-of efforts were made to 
hinder any priest from reaching him who might speak to him of 
eternity and thus persuade him to put an end to the scandals of 
his life. McCdame du Barry braved the contagion in order to 
retain her influence, and came each day to sit with the invalid ; 
but it was noticed that the king spoke to his mistress with indif- 



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92 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

ference. Their watchfulness redoubled. The Due d'Aiguillon, 
the Due de Richelieu, the Due d'Aumont, and Laborde, the 
groom of the chamber, forbade with jealous rigour the entrance 
of all suspicious persons. On the 2d of May the archbishop of 
Paris came to Versailles ; he had great difficulty in seeing the 
dying man, at whose door the Due de Richelieu tried to detain 
him. The interview did not last more than a quarter of an hour, 
and produced no result. The physicians, who had been won 
over, declared that he must not speak to the king of the sacra- 
ment on the risk of killing him, in the condition of suppuration 
in which he then was. Before this menacing declaration the 
grand almoner of France himself, the Cardinal de la Roche- 
Aymon, dared not mention the sacraments, but held himself 
ready to come forward when needed. 

Suddenly, by one of those turns whereby God often foils the 
calculations of men, the event so feared by some, so desired by 
others, occurred. On Wednesday, May 4, feeling the disease 
increase, the king called for Cardinal de la Roche-Aymon, and 
asked him what was his malady, the name of which they had 
hitherto concealed from him. When he learned that it was small- 
pox, he said, " One does not recover from that at my age; I must 
put my affairs in order." 

He sent for Madame du Barry. '* Madame," he said, " as I am 
contemplating receiving the sacrament, it is not proper for you 
to remain here, as I do not wish the occurrence at Metz to be 
repeated, and desire to avoid all scandal. Arrange your retreat 
with the Due d'Aiguillon ; I have given him orders to see that 
you lack for nothing." That same day at four o'clock the favour- 
ite departed in the carriage of the Duchesse d'Aiguillon, who 
conducted her to a country house belonging to the duke at Rueil. 
There, two leagues from Versailles, she waited, informed of every 
detail by the minister, and ready to return if the king improved. 

But the king did not improve. In vain the doctors issued sat- 
isfactory bulletins; these reassuring declarations deceived no 
one : the public, who had no longer anything but contempt for 
that monarch whom it had once so tenderly loved, received the 
news with indifference, if not with joy; the courtiers discounted 
the future. " All those who could enter the chamber were there, 
as if to witness a curious and somewhat ridiculous show. Every 
one watched all that occurred, either to write of it or to be able 
to talk of it; they even jested about it." In certain circles wishes 



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DEATH OF LOUIS XV. 93 

for the death of the king were almost openly expressed ; the agi- 
tation of the court was extreme ; the rumours, the manoeuvres, 
the intrigues, increased on all sides ; the different parties sought 
a chance to interview the confessor, who, howevei*, remained inac- 
cessible. Some courtiers, turning toward the rising sun, made 
efforts to approach the young royal family; they were repulsed 
without pity. 

In the midst of all these intrigues and despite the rapid pro- 
gress of the malady and occasional periods of delirium, the king 
preserved his self-possession and courage. Several times he 
demanded his confessor. During the night of the 6th and 7th, 
at half-past two in the morning, he said to the Due de Duras, 
who was watching by him, ** This is the third time that I have 
asked for my confessor; is the Abb6 Maudoux not here?" He 
fell into a stupor for a while ; awakening again at the end of half 
an hour, he inquired once more if the Abb6 Maudoux had not 
arrived. The latter entered ; and the courtiers, ever on the alert, 
took note, with watch in hand, that he remained with the august 
invalid sixteen minutes. When the priest went out, the king de- 
clared that he should receive the sacrament on the following day ; 
but when his physician. La Martini^re, observed that he would 
better do so at once, he determined to receive it on that very 
day. 

At five o'clock Louis XV. sent for the Due d'Aiguillon and 
spoke to him in a low voice. It was immediately surmised that 
he had given orders for the departure of the favourite, and the 
rumour spread that the confessor had made this departure a con- 
dition of absolution. Was there any truth in this rumour? That 
is a secret which God alone knows. It was noticed only that on 
three different occasions the king called for the Abb6 Maudoux, 
and that he awaited the sacrament with the greatest impatience, 
sending the Prince de Beauvau several times to the window to see 
if the grand almoner had not arrived. 

At seven o'clock Cardinal de la Roche-Aymon appeared, 
bringing the viaticum. The troops were under arms ; in obedi- 
ence to the formal prohibition of their grandfather, the dauphin 
and his brothers only followed the holy sacrament as far as the 
foot of the staircase; Mesdames accompanied it to the bed- 
chamber, where the princes of the blood and the ministers were 
assembled. As soon as he saw the gfand almoner, the invalid 
felt revive within him all the faith which forty years of disorderly 



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94 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE, 

living had not been able to extinguish; he threw off the bed- 
clothes, uncovered himself, and tried to kneel down, joining his 
hands together so fervently that it brought tears to all eyes. 
When they tried to stop him, he cried, " When the good God 
honours a miserable sinner like me by coming to him, the least 
that I can do is to receive him with respect." After he had re- 
ceived the communion, he made a sign to the grand almoner, who, 
turning to the assembled courtiers, said, " Messieurs, the king 
commands me to say, being unable to speak himself, that he 
repents of his sins, and that if he has scandalized his people he is 
sorry for it; that he is firmly resolved to return to the paths of 
his youth and to employ the remainder of his life in the defence 
of religion." When the grand almoner spoke of the remorse 
which the king felt for the scandals of his life, ** Monsieur le 
cardinal," interrupted the dying man, turning himself painfully 
on his pillow, — " Monsieur le cardinal, repeat those words ; repeat 
them." 

With this expression of repentance, which was late but gen- 
uine, and in the exercise of an edifying and sincere piety, ended 
that royal existence, so culpable before God and man. His con- 
temporaries, even the least religious, were struck by his repent- 
ance, by the steadfastness with which he sustained the moving 
ceremonial, and " the tranquillity, the patience, the sweetness, the 
courage, with which he resolved to fulfil his duties ; " and Ma- 
dame Louise wrote to the Ahh6 Bertin, " I am so consoled when 
I think of the singular favour vouchsafed to the king in his last 
moments, and which he seems to have profited by so well, that if 
it depended upon me to recall him to life, I confess that I should 
not wish to plunge him again into the midst of dangers and risk 
his soul a second time." 

After the 7th the disease grew worse ; on the 9th all hope was 
given up. The dauphin requested the prayers of the archbishop 
of Paris, and ordered the comptroller-general to send two hun- 
dred thousand francs to the poor of the capital, enjoining him to 
take that sum from his allowance and that of the dauphiness. In 
the evening the bishop of Senlis, grand almoner, administered 
extreme unction. On the morrow, at eleven o'clock, the death- 
struggle began. The grand almoner recited the prayers for the 
dying, and on that same day. May 10, between three and four 
o'clock in the afternoon, just as the cardinal pronounced the 
words proficiscere^ anima Christiana^ Louis XV., devoured by the 



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DEATH OF LOUIS XV. 95 

infection, his body already falling into decay, but his soul stead- 
fast, preserving to the end his presence of mind, and manifesting 
to the last evidences of Christian repentance, expired in the 
midst of universal indifference. A candle placed in one of the 
windows of the ch&teau informed France that his long reign of 
sixty years was over, and every one prepared hastily to depart. 
At that moment, an eye-witness recounts, there was a terrible 
noise exactly resembling thunder heard in the front room of the 
apartment; it was the crowd of courtiers deserting the ante- 
chamber of the dead sovereign to greet the new power of Louis 
XVL 



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CHAPTER IX. 

Beginning of the Reign of Louis XVI.— Difficulties of the Situa- 
tion. — The Hopes of the Public. — Popularity of the New 
Sovereigns.— Maurep AS made Minister. — Fall of the Old Min- 
isters. — Return of Choiseul. — The Politic Attitude of the 
Queen; her Repugnance to Business. — Maria Theresa, Mercy, 

AND VeRMOND urge HER TO ATTEND TO IT. — MaRIE ANTOINETTE 
RESISTS THEIR AdVICE. — SUPPERS AT THE CoURT. — ETIQUETTE. — 

The Queen emancipates herself from it. — The Inconveniences 

THAT result FROM THIS FREEDOM. — THE INOCULATION OF THE 

King. 

IT is told that when the Comtesse de Noailles, who was the first 
to enter the apartment of the dauphin and dauphiness and 
to greet them as king and queen of France, appeared, Louis 
XVI. and Marie Antoinette fell upon their knees and, weeping, 
cried, " O God, guard us, protect us ! we are too young to reign." 

It was the cry of their heart and the cry of their reason. 

The situation was indeed critical. A king of twenty, who had 
always been systematically separated from affairs; a queen of 
nineteen, who had no taste for them ; a court divided ; finances 
ruined; no prestige abroad; inextricable difficulties at home, 
which had been daily aggravated by the indifference of Louis 
XV. ; and with all this, a public which was the more exacting as 
the reforms were imperative, and entertaining the most impatient 
hopes, — ah ! Maria Theresa had good reason to say, ** I am dis- 
tressed, truly distressed ; the burden is too great." 

Among the populace all was joy and hope. They expected 
much of that young prince, whom they knew to be serious, dili- 
gent, kindly, under his timid exterior; they expected still more 
of that young princess, who had always been so beautiful and so 
good. The first acts of the new sovereigns but increased the 
confidence and exalted the enthusiasm. The king gave up his 
right to the accession jewels ; the queen renounced her right to 
the girdle, and she accompanied this renunciation with the charm- 



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THE NEW SOVEREIGNS. 97 

ing saying, " No one wears girdles nowadays." " Resurrexit " was 
graven under the statue of Henry IV. In all the windows the 
portrait of the young monarch was placed between that of Henry 
IV. and of Louis XII. with these words, "XII. and IV. make XVI." 
Voltaire wrote to Frederick II., "We have a young king, who, to be 
sure, though he does not write verse, writes excellent prose ; " and 
Gresset, complimenting the queen in the name of the Academy, 
spoke of " the universal delight, the affectionate acclamations, 
that preceded, accompanied, and followed her steps." 

With that exquisite delicacy of heart which was one of her 
charms, Marie Antoinette, among her first visits, went to see Ma- 
dame Louise, so cruelly afflicted by the death of her father and 
the illness of her sisters. 

" The queen, on embracing the Carmelite," an eye-witness relates, " held 
her for a long time in her arms without being able to speak to her, except 
by her tears. These were so abundant that they caused ours to flow, and 
those of all who witnessed them ; our august mother, who was broken- 
hearted, could scarcely pronounce a few disconnected words. Her niece 
perceived this, and bore the whole burden of the interview herself. She 
had the tact to talk to her of the sentiments of tenderness which her 
nephew felt for her, without once giving him the tide of king, — an attention 
which our august mother remarked with pleasure. * My aunt,' Marie An- 
toinette said to her, * in all that you require, address yourself to me. I will 
tell him of it ; I will beg him, I will engage him to grant it. I know him ; 
he loves you, and will do anything to please you. When you feel suffi- 
ciently strong to receive him, send me word ; I will bring him to you.' " 

What she was to her aunt she was to every one. " Those who 
return from Choisy tell marvellous things of the king and queen," 
a chronicler writes. At La Muette, whither the court was trans- 
ferred after the sojourn at Choisy, the queen received every one 
with her accustomed graciousness ; many people who had injured 
her during the preceding reign approached her with fear; she 
manifested neither humour nor resentment toward them; the 
queen did not avenge the injuries of the dauphiness. From La 
Muette she often went to walk in the Bois de Boulogne. One 
day, perceiving an old man who was working, she approached 
him and questioned him kindly. When Madame de Noailles 
tried to expostulate with her on the inconvenience of such famil- 
iarity, the queen brusquely turned her back to her; and the king, 
to whom the lady of honour, so they say, complained, contented 
himself with replying dryly, "The queen must be allowed to do 
VOL. I. — 7 

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98 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

as she pleases and to speak to whom she wishes." He himself 
had desired that the gates of the Bois de Boulogne, which were 
habitually locked, should be left open ; and he walked there, as 
his wife did, in the midst of an immense concourse of people who 
were never tired of seeing and blessing him, whom they called 
Louis the Desired. It is related that he observed in all things the 
strictest economy, and that he began a reform in the matter of 
amusements, and what cost him more, put down two hunting 
establishments, — that of the deer and of the boar ; he ordered the 
lieutenant of police, Sartines, to pay the arrears of all debts for 
nurses ; it was said that he only desired one thing, to be informed 
of whatever evil was said of him, in order to correct it ; and finally 
that he had a list made out of all the honest men of the kingdom 
which he kept always before his eyes when he had any appoint- 
ment to make. *' He barricades himself with honest men," the 
ambassador from Sweden wrote energetically. And the prince 
himself said to the Due de Noailles, when he wished to retire 
because of his age, ** Do not leave me ; I have need of honest 
men about me who will point out my duty to me." 

Immediate and important satisfaction was given to the public 
conscience. On the day following the death of Louis XV., the 
favourite was exiled to the convent of the Bernardines of Pont- 
aux-Dames, near Macon. Her brother-in-law, the Comte Jean 
du Barry, the principal author of the various intrigues, was sen- 
tenced to be arrested, and only escaped Vincennes by a precipi- 
tate flight to England. The coldness which the queen exhibited 
in public to the Due d*Aiguillon presaged his approaching fall, 
and rumour repeated with glee a saying attributed to the young 
sovereign : some one having said in her presence, " This is the 
hour when the king should enter the council with his ministers," 
"With those of the late king," she replied quickly. 

" Every one is in ecstasy, every one is wild about you," the 
empress wrote to Marie Antoinette ; " they expect the greatest 
happiness. You have revived a nation which was in extremity, 
and which was alone sustained by its affection for its princes." 
But to her faithful ambassador she was less confident; her 
political acumen did not allow her to deceive herself concerning 
the perils of the moment. " The situation of the king, of the 
ministers, and even of the State exhibits nothing that is reas- 
suring," she said ; and with the mysterious presentiment which 
sometimes illumines the heart of a mother, she added this char- 



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THE COMTE DE MAUREPAS. 99 

acteristic phrase concerning the future of her daughter, which 
events were to justify but too truly, ** I fear her happy days are 
over/' 

In fact, the intrigues and machinations which had surrounded 
to the very last the death-bed of Louis XV. were transferred with- 
out loss of heat or pertinacity to the foot of the throne of Louis 
XVL While the corpse of the old king was being carried in the 
night, and without pomp or following, to St. Denys, in the midst 
of the maledictions and insults of the crowd, the courtiers were 
quarrelling bitterly at Versailles for power and office. " The 
intrigues of the new court are abominable," the Abb6 Baudeau 
wrote, " and one would have to be more than an archangel to 
escape them." 

Who was to have control? Who was to be prime minister? 
This was the territory for which the two parties waged war. Mes- 
dames, who, despite all rules of prudence, had followed the royal 
family to Choisy, — Mesdames, whose influence over their feeble 
nephew Mercy feared, were, to be sure, separated from the court 
by the small-pox which they had caught at the bedside of their 
father; but before being laid low by the malady, Madame Ade- 
laide had had time to fire a last shot which was to deal a mortal 
wound to the entire reign: she succeeded in having an uncle 
of the Due d'Aiguillon, the Comte de Maurepas, preferred to 
Choiseul, whom the queen desired, or to Machault, who had first 
been thought of, or to Sartines, whom the king had sent for dur- 
ing the first hour. And making use with fatal cleverness of the 
remnants of her influence, which was about to disappear, but to 
which her devotion during the illness of Louis XV. had given new 
life, it was through Marie Antoinette herself, who was ignorant 
and too confiding, that she proposed this choice to Louis XVL 
Called to the cabinet of the young monarch as simple adviser, 
Maurepas came out prime minister, if not in name, at least in 
fact. 

Born in 1 701, secretary of state at twenty-four, then dismissed 
in 1749 for having offended Madame de Pompadour, Maurepas 
had since that time lived at a distance from the government. 
He resumed office at the end of twenty-five years, without hesi- 
tancy and without concern for the difficulties that had gathered 
since his fall. Witty and astute, but careless and frivolous, more 
accustomed to composing songs than to considering serious 
things, so little serious himself that in order to get on with him 



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ICX) LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

in business it was necessary to assume an air of gayety, a man of 
expedients rather than a man of principles, less dexterous in 
solving difficulties than in eluding them, he had but one aim : to 
assure his repose and that of the king by avoiding all that might 
frighten the timid good-nature of the young prince. It is asserted 
that Louis XVI. had called him simply to consult him; his naive 
confidence was surprised by the trickery of the old courtier, who 
was first insinuating and soon imposing. ** Your Majesty makes 
me prime minister, then," Maurepas had said. " No," replied 
the king, **that is not my intention." " I understand," the old 
man had answered ; ** your Majesty wishes me to teach him how 
to do without one," and he entered the council. 

Public opinion was impatient ; with that inconsiderate ardour 
which is too often characteristic of our nation, it desired the dis- 
missal of all who had been in power on the previous day, the 
recall of the exiles, and the accomplishment of every reform 
within twenty-four hours. " I am uneasy at this French enthu- 
siasm," Marie Antoinette wrote with great good sense to her 
mother; " it will be impossible to content every one in a coun- 
try where they are eager to have everything done in a moment." 
If the wise and politic heads thought it best to keep the ministers 
of the late king for a time to finish the business already in hand, 
and to reflect before making necessary changes, the public, ex- 
cited by pamphlets and songs, would hear nothing of these 
delays and these arrangements. It talked of nothing but of 
hanging the comptroller-general, and the popular refrain sent 
the chancellor, Maupeou, 

** On the route, 
On the route, 
On the route to Chatou." 

Only fifteen days after the accession of Louis XVI., a chroni- 
cler, expressing the feverish impatience of the capital, wrote that 
their great hopes were beginning to cool. On the 2d of June, 
however, the Due d'Aiguillon handed in his resignation as secre- 
tary of state for foreign affairs, but thanks to his uncle Mau- 
repas, found means to have granted to him a gratuity of five 
hundred thousand francs, which excited serious discontent. By 
an act of clemency which was opposed to all ministerial traditions, 
D'Aiguillon after his dismissal was not exiled ; he remained at 
court, where he used the favour which he had received from 
his sovereigns against them, and became one of their most im- 



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. RETURN OF CHOISEUL. lOI 

placable enemies and one of the most dangerous calumniators 
of Marie Antoinette. 

It was the queen, who, despite Mercy, had effected the dismissal 
of the Due d'Aiguillon ; but there her power ceased : she was not 
able to have him replaced by Choiseul. The most that she could 
obtain was the termination of the exile of the old adversary of 
Madame du Barry. Moreover, she was obliged to use every means 
in her power to compass so much. The king seemed as little dis- 
posed to recall Choiseul to court as to recall him to the ministry. 
Though sceptical regarding the absurd rumours of poisoning 
which had once been current, he could not pardon the ancient 
minister for the long and violent wrangles which he had had with 
the dauphin, his father. Perhaps also, as some one has justly 
remarked, the young prince, who was timid, credulous, and chaste, 
felt a repugnance to that brilliant mind, which was prompt and 
adventurous, and to the light manners of him who had expelled 
the Jesuits. But the queen insisted, even exacted, alleging that 
it was humiliating not to be able to obtain a favour for the man 
who had negotiated her marriage. ** If you invoke such a reason," 
Louis XVI. replied, ** I can refuse you nothing." Choiseul received 
permission to quit Touraine and to return to Paris. 

He arrived on June 12, in the evening, and betook himself 
on the 13th to La Muette, where the royal family was stopping; 
but if the ancient minister flattered himself that he was to resume 
his power, he was promptly undeceived. The king appeared 
embarrassed on seeing him. ** You have grown fat, Monsieur 
de Choiseul," he said to him ; " you are losing your hair, — you 
are becoming bald." The queen showered smiles and amiable 
words upon him in vain. She could not efface the impression 
produced by such a reception. Despite her amiability, despite 
the attentions of the princes of the blood and of the ministers, 
despite the acclamations of the people, the blow had struck 
home : on Tuesday, the 14th, at eight o'clock in the morning, 
Choiseul returned to Chanteloup. 

This recall was for Marie Antoinette a question of sentiment 
rather than of politics. She desired to have Choiseul minister 
from gratitude, despite her mother, who was not anxioys to see 
so active and vigilant a man at the head of foreign affairs. 
Choiseul being definitely set aside, she concerned herself little 
with the person who might succeed the Due d'Aiguillon. She 
always exhibited an extreme reluctance to meddle with business. 



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I02 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

'' She keeps out of it/' said some one who knew her well, ** both 
from principle and from inclination." Was it indolence of mind, 
vivacity of character, or antipathy to serious things? Had she a 
secret instinct of the danger of taking part in politics that always 
exists for a woman who is still young, a foreigner by birth, and ill- 
prepared by her education for any such occupation, at a court 
given up to faction, like that of Versailles, and amid a discon- 
tented and hot-headed people, like the French ? Did she say to 
herself that, save in exceptional circumstances, or when possessed 
of genius, such as her mother had, and which was given to but 
few, the part of a queen consisted rather in holding court than 
in directing affairs, and that that rdle was sufficiently great and 
sufficiently delicate? 

But were not the circumstances exceptional? Was an absolute 
abstention possible; was it desirable? Among the counsellors of 
the queen opinion was divided. 

Joseph II., whose judgment was often safe where the affairs 
of others were concerned, wrote anxiously to Leopold, ** I hope 
that all may go well, and, above all, that our sister will have notfi- 
ing to do with the intrigues of the court. I have written her to 
this end ; " and he added later, " God grant that my advice may be 
of use and bear fruit ; but you observe very truly that to per- 
severe in the determination of abstaining from taking part will 
not be easy and will require a consistency and exactitude of con- 
duct of which so young a person is scarcely capable. I have 
preached the necessity of it to her, and perhaps I am the only 
one who has. I do not guarantee that others whom we respect 
will preserve the same tenor in their letters.** 

Joseph II. did not deceive himself; Maria Theresa, who had 
at first had a presentiment of the dangers which surrounded the 
young queen, and who had written to Mercy, " I do not write to 
my daughter but on general subjects, counselling her always to 
listen to you, to follow your advice, and to be careful not to inter- 
fere ; that she should be the confidante and friend of the king, but 
should not seem to wish to govern with him; that she should 
avoid all applause which excites envy and jealousy against her. 
Her position is very delicate, and at nineteen ! My only hope is 
in you,** — Maria Theresa, on the very day that she addressed 
these sage reflections to her ambassador, wrote to her daughter 
in a different tone; she laid out for her a plan of conduct in 
politics, joining thereto the most lively exhortations on the neces- 



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MARIA THERESA'S ADVICE. 103 

sity of strengthening the Franco-Austrian alliance, and that in 
terms the most likely to move the heart and fire the imagination 
of the young sovereign : — 

** The interests, not only of our hearts, but of our States, are so infinitely 
bound up in one another, that to further them we must work together on 
the intimate footing of which the late king sought to lay the foundation, 
and continue to do so, notwithstanding the various changes that have 
taken place. 

" From my dear children I may well expect as much ; any diminution 
of harmony would kill me. Our two monarchies need repose to arrange 
our affairs. If we act in concert, no one will disturb our work, and Europe 
will enjoy happiness and tranquillity. Not only will our people be happy, 
but also even those who seek a disturbance in the belief that it would be to 
their personal advantage. The first twenty years of my reign are a proof of 
this, and since our happy alliance, which has been cemented by so many 
of the tenderest ties, this peace is beginning to be established. May it 
continue for many years ! Mercy will inform you of all that concerns our 
affairs in general ; I do not leave him in ignorance of anything.'' 

Is this not a distinct avowal that Vienna counted upon guiding 
the policy on all important points, and that the empress pro- 
posed to make her daughter her chief agent at Versailles? Who 
can doubt it, when two days later, Maria Theresa had a memoir 
of the Prince von Kaunitz forwarded to Marie Antoinette, which 
was to serve her as a guide for directing her husband on the 
various political questions of the day? Was the empress igno- 
rant of the prejudices which the alliance made by Choiseul still 
aroused in France, and had she already forgotten that after the 
death of Louis XV., her faithful ambassador was obliged to ab- 
stain from appearing at court for some time, in order to escape 
the untimely and antagonistic remarks which were made con- 
cerning the intentions of the cabinet of Vienna to govern that of 
Versailles ? 

As for Mercy, though he did not disguise to himself the obsta- 
cles which his august pupil would encounter, nor take into exclu- 
sive consideration the Austrian policy, as Maria Theresa did, he 
had always thought that the queen should keep her eyes open to 
the afTairs of France, The more he noted of the feeble, timid, 
hesitating character of the dauphin since he had become king, 
the more was he convinced that this character had need of direc- 
tion, and that he had not sufficient resolution to decide anything 



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I04 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

alone, and that he was bound to fall under some one's influence ; 
and that taking it all together, if such were to be the case, it 
would be better for this influence to spring from his wife than 
from his aunts or from any one else. 

" If during this first period the king allows himself to be governed," the 
ambassador wrote on the 1 7th of May, " and the public perceives that 
Mesdames enjoy this advantage, the credit of the queen will receive a 
mortal blow. I have implored her to be very circumspect in interfering 
in affairs, but also not to allow any one of the family to meddle in such 
matters. 

*' The king, who has, I believe, some solid qualities, has, however, few 
amiable ones. His manners are rough ; and the details of business excite 
his temper at moments. The queen must learn to bear with these out- 
bursts ; her happiness depends upon it She is loved by her husband ; 
with moderation, good-nature, and caresses, she can acquire an absolute 
empire over the king ; but she must govern without seeming to wish to 
govern." 

A month later he wrote again : — 

" Everything depends on this princess — the queen — being willing to 
surmount her repugnance to everything serious, on her deigning to listen 
with attention and to reflect a little upon what is laid before her of this 
nature. Her natural intelligence and discernment will always make her 
act rightly, whether with regard to things or circumstances. 

" But she must consider these great facts : first, that the king is of a some- 
what weak character ; second, that consequently some one will take pos- 
session of him ; third, that under all circumstances the queen must never 
lose sight for an instant of every means to assure her entire and exclusive 
ascendancy over the mind of her husband." 

The opinion of the second intimate counsellor of Marie Antoi- 
nette, Vermond, did not differ from that of Mercy : — 

" I desire rather than hope that the queen may listen to and take a 
sufficient interest in business affairs to support and augment the confidence 
of her august husband in her. Since he has ascended the throne, he 
really occupies himself a great deal with them ; it is impossible for him to 
have great confidence in the queen without speaking to her of them, but 
he will not continue to do so if she does not try to understand them and 
talk sensibly about them. The queen herself made a very precious obser- 
vation to me ; she feels that she would be unhappy should any disagree- 
ment arise between the two courts. * How could I prevent it,* she said to 
me, * if I am never to have anything to do with business ? ' 



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HUNTING-SUPPERS. 10$ 

" I know well that she must never take part in particular intrigues ; but 
I believe that she should know the principal sources of them. I know, 
too, that it would be dangerous for her to exercise any daily influence 
upon details ; but to bring her to this point, she would have to change 
from head to foot, and who could compass that?" 

Thus everything urged Marie Antoinette, despite her instinc- 
tive repulsion, to concern herself with business; everything, from 
the character of her husband, who needed to be led, to her mother, 
who insinuated the necessity of it, while having the air of preach- 
ing the contrary, to her daily counsellors, Mercy and Vermond, 
who at least advised it frankly. Despite their advice and insist- 
ence, despite even the remark which she had made to Vermond, 
her repugnance proved too strong She feared the complications 
that might result from circumstances present and to come, and 
to avoid them she was resolved, at least in the beginning, to hold 
herself aloof. Her husband, wha submitted involuntarily and 
perhaps unconsciously to her charming nature and character 
stronger than his own, talked to her gladly of his business affairs, 
and even consulted her ; she listened to him with amiability and 
attention, but nothing more. When Maupeou and Terray fell 
before the displeasure of the public, the king did not wish to 
decide upon their successors without consulting his wife. He 
sought her in her boudoir and confided to her all the reasons 
existing for and against the chancellor and comptroller-general. 
The queen listened, but permitted herself to make no remark. 
She might have made ministers, as her mother desired ; she had 
no wish to do so. 

A question presently arose which belonged to her province 
and absorbed her attention for the moment. 

Court etiquette did not permit the queen or princesses of the 
blood to eat with men. When the royal couple dined in public, 
they were served by women. When the king went to the hunt, 
there was supper for the hunters afterward, from which the queen 
was excluded. Assemblies of this kind had not a little contrib- 
uted, so it was said, to plunge Louis XV. into the disorders of 
his last years and to keep him there. Would they not be a temp- 
tation for a prince, who was virtuous, to be sure, but young and 
feeble ; and would the purity of his mind withstand the liberty 
of language and action which those nocturnal parties seemed to 
authorize? There was danger; and Marie Antoinette resolved 
to parry it by realizing a project which she had cherished for a 



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I06 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

year, of substituting for these hunting-suppers suppers in society 
over which she should preside, and to which she would invite 
the royal family and the principal personages of the court. Mercy 
encouraged her, and all reasonable persons saw therein the surest 
means of separating the king from bad companions. But it was 
necessary to forestall objections. Might not Mesdames, attached 
from habit and jealousy to the old traditions, and still holding 
great sway over the mind of their nephew, interdict a scheme 
which would in their eyes involve a grave breach of etiquette, 
and give new proof of the influence of their niece? To the first 
overtures which his wife made to him, the king replied but 
vaguely, alleging the necessity of consulting Madame Victoire, 
not to say Madame Adelaide. Surprised and displeased at these 
subterfuges, Marie Antoinette insisted, and had a very lively in- 
terview with her husband ; finally she brought such energy and 
force of reasoning to bear that she conquered him. Forthwith 
the first supper was fixed for the following Saturday, October 22. 
Mesdames were absent; when they returned, the custom was 
established, and the old princesses had no other resource but to 
ask permission to assist at these reunions which they had at first 
disapproved of. 

The innovation was favourably received ; the public applauded ; 
it understood, as a chronicler said, that it was not for the pleas- 
ure of supping in company, but from well-understood political 
and prudential motives, that the queen had instituted these sup- 
pers. At the court their success was not less great It was soon 
necessary instead of one supper a week to have two, — on Tues- 
days and Thursdays. The king named the gentlemen, the queen 
the ladies, who were to be invited. Every one schemed for the 
honour of being invited, and departed enraptured. The queen 
treated the guests with her ordinary afl*ability, and every day the 
talk of Paris related some trait of goodness or of condescension. 
The king himself enjoyed these assemblies, and his brusque 
nature grew more amiable. Attentive without gallantry to the 
women, kind without familiarity to the men, he astonished the 
court by his affable and polished bearing, as well as by his un- 
usual ease ; and as usual it was to the queen that they attributed 
this happy development of the qualities of her husband. 

The young princess enjoyed her triumph, and who knows if 
she did not see in the success of this first innovation encourage- 
ment to undertake others and to emancipate herself from the 



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ETIQUETTE. 107 



odious exactions of etiquette? Etiquette, that was her familiar 
enemy ; she encountered it everywhere, during every hour of the 
day, at every step ; it repressed her impulses, spoiled her pleas- 
ures, obtruded itself in her friendships. A brief sketch of Marie 
Antoinette's day at this epoch will show how insupportable was 
that excessive regulation which left no liberty to any impulse. 

The queen usually awoke at about eight o'clock. A woman 
of the wardrobe then entered, carrying a basket which contained 
two or three chemises, some handkerchiefs, some towels; this 
was what was called the "offering" of the morning. The first 
waiting-woman presented a book, in which were pasted samples 
of gowns, full dress, undress, etc. ; there were ordinarily for each 
season twelve full toilets, twelve demi-toilets, twelve rich dresses 
with panzers. The queen marked with a pin the garments which 
she chose for the day, — a full dress, an undress for the afternoon, 
an evening dress for the play and for the supper. The book of 
patterns was immediately carried away, and the garments chosen 
were brought in, in a large taffeta. 

The queen took a bath nearly every day; a large tub was 
rolled into her room, and the bathers were admitted with all the 
accessories of a bath. The queen wrapped herself in a long robe 
of English flannel, buttoned to the bottom, and when she came 
out of the bath a sheet was held very high before her to screen 
her entirely from the sight of her women. Then she returned to 
bed clothed in a cloak of white taffeta, and took a book or a piece 
of embroidery. At nine o'clock she breakfasted ; on the days of 
the bath, in the bath itself on a tray placed upon the lid of the 
tub ; on other days in bed, or sometimes on a little table placed 
before her sofa. Intimates were then admitted. The breakfast 
was very simple, consisting of a little coffee or chocolate. 

At noon the grand toilet took place. This was the time of the 
grandes entries. Folding-chairs were wheeled into a circle for 
the superintendent, the ladies of honour and of the bedchamber, 
the governess of the Children of France ; the princes of the blood, 
captains of the guard, and all the high officials who had entrance 
came to pay their court; the ladies of the palace did not come 
until after the toilet. The queen saluted by bowing her head or 
by a slight inclination, if it were a prince of the blood ; she leaned 
upon her toilet-table to indicate that she was about to rise. The 
brothers of the king ordinarily came while her hair was being 
dressed. The toilet-table, usually very elaborate and very rich. 



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I08 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

was drawn to the middle of the room. It was there that the 
dressing of the body took place. The lady of honour handed 
her her chemise and poured the water for her to wash her hands ; 
the lady of the bedchamber passed the skirt of her gown or of 
her full dress, arranged her fichu, and clasped her necklace. It 
was at this moment that Monsieur Randon of the Tower, on the 
first of each month, handed to the queen, in a purse of white 
leather lined with taffeta and embroidered with silver, the money 
destined for her charities or for her play. Later Marie Antoinette 
abolished this ceremonial ; when her hair was dressed, she saluted 
the ladies who were in the room, and followed only by her own 
women, entered her boudoir to dress herself; there she found her 
modiste. Mademoiselle Bertin, the supreme arbiter of fashion and 
taste at that period. 

Her toilet completed, the queen, accompanied by the superin- 
tendent, the ladies of honour and of the bedchamber, the ladies 
of the palace, her gentlemen-in-waiting, her chief equerry, her 
clergy, the princesses of the royal family, passed through the 
Salon de la Paix and traversed the gallery on her way to mass. 
She heard it with the king in the tribune facing the high altar 
except on days of full service, when she heard it below on a 
carpet of velvet fringed with gold. 

After mass came dinner. The maitre (Thdtel entered the 
chamber of the queen and announced to her that it was served, 
and handed to her the menu. Every Sunday there was dinner in 
public, in the cabinet ol the nobles. The ladies of title who had 
the privilege sat on folding-chairs at the two sides of the table ; 
the ladies without title remained standing. The queen dined 
alone with the king; behind the chair of the king stood the cap- 
tain of the guard and the first gentleman of the chamber; behind 
the chair of the queen stood her gentleman-in-waiting, her chief 
equerry, and her mattre d'hdtel, who superintended the service 
without leaving his place. The prince nearest the crown pre- 
sented a bowl to the king to wash his hands at the moment 
when he sat down at table; a princess performed the same 
service for the queen. 

Marie Antoinette ate very little, of white meat only, and never 
drank any wine. At supper she contented herself with a little 
bouillon, the wing of a chicken, and a glass of water in which she 
dipped some little biscuits. On leaving the dinner-table, she re- 
turned alone to her apartment with her women, took off h^x panier 



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E'Mquette. 109 



and the lower part of her robe, and prepared herself for the duties 
of the evening. 

Every detail of her life, even the most intimate, every detail of 
the toilet, even the form of a bow of ribbon, was thus regulated ; 
each servant had his fixed place, and his service assigned to him 
beforehand. If the queen, for example, asked for a glass of 
water, the lackey presented a silver-gilt platter to the first waiting- 
woman, on which stood a covered goblet and a little carafe ; but 
if the lady of honour appeared, it was she who offered the tray, 
and if Madame or the Comtesse d'Artois happened to enter at 
that moment, the tray had to pass from the hands of the lady of 
honour to those of the princess before reaching the queen. Noth- 
ing was passed directly to the sovereign; her handkerchief, her 
gloves, were laid on a long gold platter or silver-gilt tray called 
the gantHre, It was the first woman-in-waiting who thus pre- 
sented to the queen anything that she needed, provided that a 
lady of the bedchamber, or lady of honour, or a princess were 
not present, and always in the same order as observed for the 
glass of water. 

An anecdote related by Madame Campan will give a better 
idea of all these details, and of the insupportable tyranny of 
etiquette : — 

" One winter day it chanced that the queen, already quite undressed, 
was on the point of putting on her chemise. I held it all unfolded ; the 
lady of honour entered, hastened to take off her gloves, and took the 
chemise. Some one scratched at the door. It opened, and Madame la 
Duchesse d'OrMans appeared ; taking off her gloves, she advanced to take 
the chemise, but the lady of honour could not give it to her ; she returned 
it to me ; I gave it to the princess. Some one scratched again ; it was 
Madame la Comtesse de Provence ; the Duchesse d*Orl^ans presented the 
chemise to her. The queen held her arms crossed over her bosom and 
appeared to be cold. Madame, observing her painful attitude, contented 
herself with throwing down her handkerchief, kept on her gloves, and on 
putting on the chemise disarranged the queen's head-dress. The queen 
began to laugh to disguise her impatience, but not before murmuring sev- 
eral times between her teeth, * This is odious I what importunity I ' " 

This is one among a thousand instances ; there was not an act 
in the life of the princes which was not subjected to this inflexible 
etiquette. It pursued them in their most secret intimacy, in their 
pleasures, in their sufferings, in their infirmities. Vanity and 
personal interest, which are ever alive, learned to make use of 



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no LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

these customs, which transformed the domestic services, even 
the most humble, into honourable and often lucrative preroga- 
tives ; and the highest nobles knew how to advance their fortunes 
by means of their right to ** give a glass of water, to hand a che- 
mise, or to take out a basin." " I should never finish," said the 
Comte d'Hesecques, ** if I recounted all the little things that one 
must know, not only to be a perfect courtier, but in order not to 
make mistakes." The lady of honour to the queen, the Comtessc 
de Noailles, had been brought up with a respect for and knowl- 
edge of etiquette, which often made her exaggerate the impor- 
tance of it. For her a smile contrary to rule was a crime; a 
bonnet-pin misplaced almost made her fall in a faint. She 
seemed the personification of etiquette; and in a moment of 
good or perhaps of ill humour, her royal mistress had given her the 
nickname of ** Madame TEtiquette," to the great joy of the 
young court and of the public, but to the great scandal of some 
old dowagers who would not listen to reason on the subject of 
ancient traditions. 

But how was the queen, with her lively and independent nature, 
to submit to these perpetual restrictions to which she had not 
been accustomed from her youth? Had not her mother more 
than once urged her to emancipate herself from them, and did 
not her husband encourage a simplicity of manners toward which 
his own taste disposed him? Everything, then, urged her to 
shake off the yoke of etiquette; she did so, perhaps too com- 
pletely. Curtailed of certain puerilities, which were but ridicu- 
lous exaggerations, this etiquette was requisite with a people 
indiscreet and discontented like the French; the mystery with 
which it surrounded the sovereigns seemed to exalt them, and 
served to maintain their necessary prestige. Especially necessary 
was it, a contemporary has remarked, at the very time when it 
was given up. The unfortunate Louis XVI. recognized this later 
in an hour sadly solemn, a few days previous to mounting the 
scaffold, in one of those interviews with his defenders wherein 
he loved to recall the happier past. 

♦'To live in the society of the favourite," he said, "was derogatory to 
the dauphiness. Forced to withdraw into a sort of retirement, she adopted 
a way of life free from etiquette and restraint ; she brought the habit of 
this to the throne. These manners, new to the court, were too much in 
accord with my natural tastes for me to wish to oppose them. I knew 
not then how dangerous it is for sovereigns to be seen from too near. 



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THE KING'S INOCULATION. HI 

Familiarity destroys respect, with which it is necessary for those who gov- 
ern to be surrounded. At first the public applauded the abandonment 
of those old customs ; then it looked upon it as a crime." 

A few first murmurs, precursors of so many others, made them- 
selves heard when the king and his brothers were inoculated. 
It was the prince himself who had desired it, but it was an inno- 
vation; the public attributed the idea of it to the queen, and were 
angry with her for it Inoculation, though customary in the 
North, was but little known then in France, and did not inspire 
confidence ; it was thought very imprudent for the entire royal 
family to undergo an experiment of which time had not yet i 
proved the efficacy beyond doubt. It was asserted that the 
warm season was unfavourable; and every one remembered that 
small-pox had always been fatal to the Bourbons. 

Maria Theresa herself expressed an echo of these complaints 
and apprehensions to her daughter. Fortunately nothing hap- 
pened to justify the general uneasiness. Inoculated on Satur- 
day, June 1 8, the king made no change in his way of living; 
the eruption took place under the best conditions; at the end 
of two days the fever passed, and on July i, Louis XVI. could 
write gayly to his mother-in-law, — 

"I assure you, together with my wife, my dear mamma, that I am quite 
recovered from my inoculation and that I have suffered but very litde. 
I should ask permission to embrace you if my face were in better con- 
dition." 



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CHAPTER X. 

The New Ministry. — Du Muy. — Turcot. — Vergennes. — Recall 
OF THE Parliament. — Marie Antoinette, Queen of Fashion 
AND Taste. — Mademoiselle Bertin. — The Coiffure. — Amuse- 
ments at Court. — The Enthusiasm of Horace Walpole. — 
Moderation of the Queen in her Tastes; her Popularity. 

— Representations of Gluck's " Iphigenia."— Goodness of the 
Queen. — Messieurs d'Assas, de Bellegarde, de Castelnau, de 

PONTECOULANT. — DISAGREEMENTS IN THE ROYAL FAMILY. — FiRST 

Calumnies. — Beaumarchais and the Jew, Angelucci. — Journey 
OF THE Archduke Maximilian. — Questions of Precedence. — 
Mistakes of the Archduke.— The Nickname of the "Austrian." 

— Marie Antoinette no longer knows German. 

HIS inoculation had not distracted Louis XVI. from the cares 
of government. It was with great difficulty that, even dur- 
ing the days of fever, his wife had been able to persuade him not 
to hold the council, and to abstain from work; but so soon as the 
success of the operation was assured, he resumed his laborious 
habits. Desirous of completing his education, he studied with 
perseverance, and especially the history of France, meditating 
upon the laws and customs of the kingdom, comparing the course 
of different reigns, shutting himself up sometimes to run through, 
in the silence of his work-room, the papers which his father had 
left him on divers subjects pertaining to the government, reading 
the best books that appeared on administration and politics, and 
annotating them with his own hand. He never lost a moment; 
his rising and toilet did not last an instant; every morning he 
worked for three or four hours; and in the evening, on his return 
from the hunt, which continued to be one of his favourite amuse- 
ments, he again passed a certain time at his desk, or in discourse 
with his ministers, often retaining their portfolios and not sending 
them back until the following day, with his observations. 

The ministry had finally been formed. On the Sth of June, 
the Mar6chal du Muy and the Comte de Vergennes succeeded to 
the Due d'Aiguillon, the former as minister of war, the second as 



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DU MUY, TURCOT, AND VERGENNES. II3 

minister of foreign affairs. On July 14, Turgot replaced De 
Boynes in the marine. On August 24, Maupeou and Terray 
were dismissed. Hue de Miromesnil, former president of the 
Parliament of Rouen, received the seals ; Turgot took the general 
control and left the marine to Sartines. Of all the old cabinet 
there remained but the Due de la Vrilli^re, who was saved from 
the general overthrow by the protection of his nephew, Maure- 
pas. ** Here is a fine St. Bartholomew of ministers," some one 
remarked on learning the wished-for fall of Maupeou and Terray. 
" Yes/' replied the ambassador from Spain, the Count of Aranda, 
** but it is not a massacre of the Innocents." 

On the following day, when the women of the halles came 
according to custom to felicitate the king on the occasion of the 
festival of Saint Louis, they said, alluding to his well-known love 
of the hunt, " Sire, we have come to compliment your Majesty 
on yesterday's chase; your grandfather never made so good 
a one." 

The new appointments gave satisfaction to the public ; they 
were both a reparation and a promise. The Mardchal du Muy 
had been the most intimate friend of the dauphin, father of the 
king ; after the fall of Choiseul he had refused the portfolio of 
war in order not to bend the knee to Madame du Barry. Sar- 
tines had made a name for himself as lieutenant of police ; and 
although this office did not seem to fit him specially for the new 
post confided to him, he was able by his intelligence and activity 
to impart an impetus to the French marine whose effects were 
felt in the American war. Turgot had an undoubted reputation 
among economists. While intendant of Limousin he had made 
very important reforms, and it is related that when he left that 
province, where he had made himself so beloved, the cur^s an- 
nounced publicly that they should say mass for him, and the 
peasants left their work to assist at the mass. " He is an honest 
and enlightened man; that is sufficient for me," the king had 
said when he had been proposed to him. An honest man, that 
was the epithet which every one attached to the name of Turgot. 
" Every one acknowledges that he is upright and honest," Mercy 
wrote to the Baron de Neny. '* He has the reputation of being 
an honest man," the queen on her side wrote. 

The Comte de Vergennes had been ambassador to Constanti- 
nople, then to Sweden, during the recent coup (T/tat of Gustavus 
in. He was a diplomat of the old school, a gourmet perhaps, 

VOL. I. — 8 

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114 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

but a hard worker who had borne himself with distinction in the 
missions which he had fulfilled ; of a moderate disposition, more- 
over, an enemy to bold ventures, such, in a word, as suited a 
timorous prince like Louis XVI. Although he had been greatly 
prejudiced against the Austrian alliance, the queen treated him 
with great amiability and undertook, in a matter which touched 
him very closely, since it concerned his wife, to smooth the diffi- 
culties relative to the presentation of the Comtesse de Vergennes. 

A serious affair of a different nature obtruded itself in the 
deliberations of the minister, and claimed the decision of Louis 
XVL Should the Parliament, exiled by Louis XV., be recalled 
and re-established, or should they maintain a reform which had 
been violently accomplished, no doubt, but which from certain 
points of view — those of politics and justice — offered certain very 
real advantages? Considering the desire which Louis XVL felt 
to gain the affection of his people, the care which Maurepas took 
to calm public impatience, and the discredit which the pam- 
phlets of Beaumarchais had thrown upon the new Parliament, and 
the open demand of public opinion, the hesitation of the king 
and his minister could not be long. The disgrace of Maupeou 
was, and was bound to be, the signal for the recall of the Parlia- 
ment. Despite Vergennes and Turgot, they were re-established 
at the bed of justice held on the 12th of November, 1774, with 
certain restrictions which seemed good, but which were only irri- 
tating. To the eyes of many clear-sighted persons, this was a 
mistake, and Maria Theresa's good sense was not mistaken. " It 
is incomprehensible," she said, " that the king and his ministers 
should destroy the work of Maupeou." It seemed to him pos- 
sible to recall the members without reconstituting the body, to 
establish order in the administration of justice without building 
up a political authority which had so often undermined the royal 
authority. The Parliament, intoxicated by the popularity which 
greeted their return, were not long in resuming their old tricks, 
and their systematic opposition was one of the principal obstacles 
which rendered ineffective the wise reforms of Turgot and the 
generous intentions of Louis XVI. 

As for the queen, while not desiring to meddle in any way, she 
could not resist the noise of applause, and the happiness of 
making others happy. " I have great joy," she wrote, ** in think- 
ing that there is no one in exile or misfortune." On the day fol- 
lowing this remark, indeed, the princes of the blood were to reap- 



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SHE IS QUEEN OF FASHION. US 

pear at the chateau, the royal mourning was to come to an end, 
and the queen, for the future assured of the brilliancy of the 
Col . t, Lusie herself with trying to make it even more resplendent. 
Louis XVI. inexpert in all matters of amusement, left to his wife 
the responsibility of organizing the entertainments for the win- 
ter ; it was the department which he abandoned to her adminis- 
tration, and Marie Antoinette accepted it with pleasure. Leaving 
to the monarch and his ministers all business affairs, she limited 
her efforts to governing the court ; it was the only empire for 
which she felt any ambition. She ruled it with ease, and her 
decrees were royal ; she was the queen of taste, and she wielded 
the sceptre with a brilliancy and certainty which allowed of no 
rivalry. 

The women of the court, while not possessing her beauty, wished 
none the less to appear in the same garb. Whatever the young 
princess adopted became the fashion ; from the moment that she 
affected a colour no one would wear any other. One day she 
chose a dress of dark-brown taffeta. " It is puce-coloured," said 
the king; and the dyers busied themselves only with making 
puce-coloured stuffs of various shades, — old puce, young puce, 
stomach, back, head, and thigh of puce. Another time the queen 
wore a satin of a delicate ash-gray. *' The colour of the hair of 
the queen!" Monsieur cried gallantly; and immediately the 
entire court clothed itself to match,; and one sent locks of the 
amiable sovereign's hair to Lyons and to the Gobelins in order 
that the exact shade might be copied. Fashion entered the 
field, and, as always in France, exaggerated fashion, above all, 
when Mademoiselle Bertin, whom the Duchesse de Chartres had 
recommended to the queen, became the dictator of it ; she be- 
came intoxicated by the patronage of her august client, fancied 
herself a minister, and even forgot herself so far one day as to 
say to a lady who came to consult her, " Show Madame the pat- 
terns of my last work for her Majesty." It was she who developed, 
in a few years, in Marie Antoinette a love of dress, though her 
taste had formerly been very moderate, and later was to grow 
simple again beneath the shades of Trianon. 

With the modiste, there was the designer of costumes, Boc- 
quet, whose sketches the dressmaker carried out for the court 
balls; by the side of Mademoiselle Bertin and Bocquet was the 
hair-dresser, Leonard. He was not the hair-dresser in title ; the 
hair-dresser in title was called Larseneur ; but the latter had neither 



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Il6 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

taste nor delicacy, and as soon as he was gone, Marie Antoinette, 
who out of goodness of heart did not wish to dismiss him, called 
Leonard and had him undo the edifice which had been so awk- 
wardly constructed. With such noble patronage, Leonard soon 
became the fashion ; but he, at least, paid his debt of gratitude 
by a devotion without bounds, and a fidelity which misfortune 
could not alter. 

Under his influence and that of Mademoiselle Bertin, the head- 
dresses attained colossal proportions. There was a whole scaf- 
folding of gauze, of flowers and feathers, — of feathers especially, 
interwoven with the hair, which was crimped, curled, braided, 
frizzed ; a veritable chef cTceuvre of imagination and patience. 
A whole landscape was worn upon the head, a mountain, a 
meadow studded with flowers, a brook, an English garden, a ves- 
sel on the rough sea, etc. The designs and the names for them 
varied to infinity, from the aigrette, which took its name of 
quesaco from the Memoirs of Beaumarchais, to the coiffure i 
Vinoculation and au lever de la reine, to the coiffure au chien 
coiichant^ or h tk^risson, d la baigneuse^ au bandeau de Vamaufy 
d la frivolit^t d la belle pouUy not to forget the bonnets au Colisie 
oxdr la candeur^ the hats d Vanglaiseox d la Henri /F., the toques 
d Vespagnolette ; nor must we forget above all the puff* au senti- 
ment, in which the Duchesse de Chartres succeeded in picturing 
her son, the Due de Valois, in the arms of his nurse, with a little 
negro page and a parrot pecking at cherries. The dimensions 
grew to be prodigious, so that the head of a woman, it is said, 
attained the height of seventy-two inches, and it became neces- 
sary to increase the height of the doors in order to allow ladies 
in full dress to pass through. 

The rumours of these extravagances even reached Vienna, 
with comments and exaggerations, of course, and Maria Theresa 
became alarmed for her daughter : — 

" I cannot help touching upon a point which many of the papers dwell 
upon but too often. This is the coiffure which you have adopted. They 
say that from the roots of the hair it rises thirty-six inches, and that feathers 
and ribbons are on top of this ! You know that I have always thought 
that we should follow the fashion with moderation, and should never ex- 
aggerate. A young and pretty queen with many charms has no need of 
such folly ; on the contrary, the simplicity of her adornment will make her 
seem but the more beautiful, and is better suited to the rank of a queen. 
It is she who should set the fashion, and every one will hasten to follow 



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COURT AMUSEMENTS. 11/ 

even her trivial changes ; but I, who love and follow my little queen at 
every step, — I cannot forbear warning her against this petty frivolity, 
though I have, on the other hand, so many reasons to be satisfied and 
even to be proud of what you are doing." 

And the queen immediately replied, " It is true that I busy 
myself with my adornment ; as for the feathers, every one wears 
them, and II would seem extraordinaty not to do so." 

Whatevei tlie gazettes may have said, and Maria Theresa 
thought, ^*o truth is that Marie Antoinette but followed the 
fashion, and had even tried at times to moderate it. Indeed, the 
public was not so scandalized as some of the chroniclers would 
make out, and in a collection of head-dresses published a little 
later, these rhymes were printed beneath a pretty engraving of 
the queen in her morning dress : — 

" Behold the coiffure of our queen. 
Whose perfect taste is therein seen. 
*T were well her style to imitate. 
Herself in acts both small and great 
For should you copy her good deeds, 
You will inspire our love, respect. 
And like her, sow the seeds 
Of charity towards God's elect" 

Whether at Versailles or at Fontainebleau, the success of the 
young sovereign was brilliant. The apartment in which she held 
her play, however vast it might be, was always full ; at play as at 
the suppers, whose establishment we have described above, the 
queen wished that every one should be content with the recep- 
tion he met with, and she succeeded admirably. " In this re- 
spect her Majesty has reached perfection," the scrupulous Mercy 
wrote. On Jan. i, 1775, a large number of people, ministers, the 
chief officials, and more than two hundred ladies betook them- 
selves to Versailles to pay their court, and each one departed 
filled with respect and gratitude. During the following ^yinter 
there were representations at Versailles three time^ a week, two 
in French and one in Italian ; every Monday there was a ball 
with quadrilles in costume and contre-danses. These offered but 
fresh opportunities for the charming princess to display her 
grace : strangers or Frenchmen, all alike fell under her charm ; 
it was exaltation, infatuation. 

*' No one had eyes for any one save the queen," Walpole wrote in the 
month of August, 1 775, at the marriage festivities of Madame Clotilde. '^ All 



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Il8 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

the Hebes, Floras, Helens, Graces, are but street-walkers by the side of 
her. Whether she is standing or sitting, she is the image of beauty ; when 
she moves, it is grace personified. She wore a dress of silver strewn with 
laurel-rose, few diamonds or feathers. They say that she does not dance 
in time, but then it is the time that is wrong. ... In the matter of beauties 
I saw not one, or else the queen effaced them all." 

Three years later the ambassador from Morocco, assisting at 
one of these court balls, and asked by the Comte d'Artois who 
among the ladies present seemed to him the most beautiful, the 
queen excepted, replied gallantly that the restriction imposed by 
the prince made it impossible for him to answer, which response 
was very well turned for a barbarian. 

What was even more surprising was that these fites entailed 
but a very moderate expenditure. Turgot himself found nothing 
to say against them. The queen had desired that the balls should 
take place in her own apartment, which gave them a semi-private 
character, and thus avoided the expenses which more ceremonial 
balls would have necessitated. She had also given up having the 
opera brought to Versailles, and decided that when she wished to 
hear it, she would go to Paris. This was at the time when the 
comptroller-general, faithful to his celebrated programme, — no 
bankruptcy, no increase of taxation, no loans, — was beginning his 
economical reforms. The queen lent herself to them with the 
greatest good-will, and she did not hesitate to give up any amuse- 
ments that she feared might become expensive or embarrassing. 
If later she allowed herself to be led into certain prodigalities, it 
is the more important to note that at the beginning of her reign 
such prodigalities were neither in accord with her principles nor 
her tastes. 

The public knew this ; it saw with satisfaction their sovereigns 
setting the first example of economy in their expenditures and 
restraint in their pleasures. It knew also that the young princess 
was opposed to the renewal of the monopoly in the commerce of 
bread-stuflfs, which had been established by the Abb6 Terray, and 
which the public had damned with the name of the Famine Com- 
pact. It adored her, and Mercy could say with truth that if the 
authors of the libels which were beginning to appear became 
known in Paris, nothing could save them from the anger of the 
people. "Let us avenge our charming queen, of whom this 
wretch has dared to speak evil and write libels," they had cried, 
on burning the eflSgy of the Chancellor Maupeou. 



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HER GOODNESS. II9 



Every appearance of Marie Antoinette in the capital was a 
veritable triumph; and when on Wednesday, Jan, 13, 1775, she 
went without equipage to the opera to assist at a performance of 
Gluck's ** Iphigenia," the people gathered in crowds along her 
route and applauded with enthusiasm. In the second act of the 
piece the actor who played the rdle of Achilles, instead of reciting 
exactly the line, 

" Sing, celebrate your queen,*' 

advanced toward the footlights and boxes and sang, 

^ Oh, let us sing and celebrate our queen ! 
For Hymen holds her 'neath his laws enchained, 
And soon will make us happy evermore." 

The entire audience joined in the delicate homage ; there were 
innumerable plaudits and acclamations ; the chorus was repeated ; 
and the cries of *' Long live the queen ! " were so noisy that the 
performance was interrupted for more than a quarter of an hour. 
Monsieur, Madame, and the Comte d'Artois, who were in the 
royal box, were the first to applaud. The queen was so touched 
by these striking indications of sympathy that she could not re- 
strain her tears; and when she went out, her eyes still shining 
and wet with tears, she saluted the people with an air so full of 
emotion, and an affability so moving, that the cries of joy were 
redoubled. 

Marie Antoinette reigned not only by her grace, but by her 
goodness. She sent relief to the poor, to the wounded, to the 
victims of fires. She heard that the family of the Chevalier 
d'Assas, notwithstanding the historical devotion of the captain to 
the regiment of Auvergne, was living in the country in oblivion 
and obscurity. She immediately called the brother of the hero 
to the court and had a company of cavalry given to him. She 
obtained a new hearing of the case of Messieurs de Bellegarde 
and de Moustiers, who had been pursued by the spite of the Due 
d'Aiguillon ; and when their innocence had been established, and 
the two prisoners, set at liberty, came with their wives and children 
to thank their benefactress, she replied modestly that justice 
alone had been done, and that one should congratulate her only 
on the greatest happiness arising from her position, — that of being 
able to lay before the king just claims. As a token of gratitude 
Madame de Bellegarde had a picture painted in which she was 
represented with her husband kneeling before the queen and car- 



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120 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

lying in her arms her child, from whose head the princess turned 
aside a suspended blade. The queen was greatly touched, and 
placed the picture in her apartment. In the same way she pro- 
tected Lally Tolendal, called him herlittle martyr, and aided him 
in his eflforts to rehabilitate his father. 

The Marquis de Pontecoulant, major-general of the life guards, 
had, we know not how, displeased the dauphiness during the life- 
time of Louis XV. The young princess, greatly incensed against 
him, had even declared that she should never forget his conduct. 
When Louis XVL ascended the throne, Monsieur de Pontecoulant, 
remembering that he had incurred the displeasure of the new sov- 
ereign, placed his resignation in the hands of the Prince de Beau- 
vau, captain of the guards. Marie Antoinette heard of it. ** The 
queen," she said, ** does not remember the quarrels of the dau- 
phiness, and it is I who beg Monsieur de Pontecoulant to think 
no longer of what I have forgotten." After so gracious an insist- 
ence his resignation was withdrawn. 

Finally, a councillor of the Parliament, Monsieur de Castelnau, 
from Bordeaux, who had fallen madly in love with Marie Antoi- 
nette, and pursued her everywhere with his declarations and im- 
portunities, was sentenced to imprisonment; the queen, though 
greatly incensed at the unfortunate man, intervened. " Let him 
annoy me," she said, " but do not let him be deprived of the hap- 
piness of being at liberty." 

She had other enemies. On the day following her accession, 
and in her own family, she encountered opposition and jealousy. 
The Comte and Comtesse de Provence, the Comte and Comtesse 
d'Artois, instigated in secret by Mesdames, refused to go each 
morning to pay their court to the king and queen as etiquette 
required. Louis XVL, with his excessive good-nature, did not 
wish that his brothers should address him as " your Majesty ; " 
Marie Antoinette, always kind too, often too kind, allowed the 
same simplicity in her relations with her brothers-in-law and 
sisters-in-law. Maria Theresa was uneasy at this, and with her 
German roughness reprimanded her daughter for this condescen- 
sion. " You must keep your place," she wrote her, ** and know 
how to play your part; in that manner you will put yourself 
and every one else at ease. Every condescension and consid- 
eration to every one, but no familiarity, no gossip. You will 
thus avoid annoyances." The fears of the empress were soon 
realized. On public occasions, when the royal family were as- 



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FIRST CALUMNIES. 121 

sembled, there was such an appearance of equality among the 
three princes that a stranger could not have distinguished the 
king from his brothers. The Comte d'Artois especially, who was 
always petulant, affected a shocking familiarity. The Comte de 
Provence, who was more diplomatic, did not make himself so 
conspicuous, but worked in secret. More ambitious than ever on 
seeing at the end of four years no heir presumptive to the throne 
appear, he aspired to enter the council of State, where he counted 
on playing an important part, and he blamed the queen for the 
defeat of his pretensions. Madame Adelaide, always bitter and 
envious, had not forgiven her niece for the diminution of her m- 
fluence. Maurepas and his wife, jealous of a power which threat- 
ened them, allied themselves to their nephew, D'Aiguillon, who 
was still smarting from his fall, and who used his knowledge of 
the court and the connections he had kept there to further his 
personal spite. Hence arose underhand manoeuvres, injurious 
songs, and cynical verses ; it would seem as though the hidden 
object of the enemies of the queen was to ruin her in public 
estimation and in the affection of her husband, to the end, per- 
haps, of having the young woman, whose beauty provoked 
comparison and whose virtue seemed a rebuke, sent back to 
Germany. 

When the ladies of the court made their courtesies of moum- 
mg after the death of Louis XV., the queen allowed herself to 
smile, not at the antiquated costume of certain venerable dowa- 
gers, but at a witticism made at their expense by the Marquis de 
Clermont-Tonnerre. Immediately the makers of couplets set 
themselves to work; and on the following day the echoes of 
Versailles repeated this insulting refrain, which but too plainly 
betrayed the secret intentions of the conspirators : — 

" Little queen of twenty, 
You who treat us badly. 
You shall cross again the barrier, 
Laire, laire, Ian laire." 

When, after the inoculation of the king and his brothers, the 
court for the first time was transferred to Marly, Marie Antoi- 
nette, wishing to enjoy the pure air of a beautiful summer night, 
expressed a desire to see the sun rise. She spoke to her hus- 
band of it ; the king consented willingly, but being accustomed to 
going to bed at a fixed hour, did not care to sacrifice his sleep 



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122 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

for any such spectacle. The queen betook herself at three 
o'clock in the morning to a high point in the garden of Marly. 
A large number of people followed her, and her women accom- 
panied her. But her customary defamers took care not to miss 
so good an opportunity, and some days later a little pamphlet, 
** flat, obscure, and despicable," as an author has said who knew, 
and execrated by all good Frenchmen, but eagerly sought for by 
courtiers versed in scandal and women too much at odds with 
virtue to believe in that of others, transformed this innocent fancy 
of the young sovereign into an infamous orgy. 

Almost at the same time there appeared in London — that 
refuge of hardened writers and anonymous defamers — an odious 
libel, the prelude and model of so many others, under rather 
mysterious circumstances, which it may not be without interest 
to recall here. 

One of the most brilliant minds, but also one of the most un- 
scrupulous characters, of that century was a man named Beau- 
marchais, who was ever ready to undertake doubtful intrigues, 
or to venture on disreputable undertakings, and who had been 
charged during the last days of Louis XV. to buy and to destroy 
a brochure against Madame du Barry. When he returned to 
Paris, after having succeeded in this delicate enterprise, he found 
Louis XV. at St. Denys, and Louis XVI. on the throne. He 
could hardly hope that the new king would recompense him for 
a service rendered to the woman whom he had just exiled to 
Pont-aux-Dames. Immediately changing his plan with that ver- 
satility the personification of which he was later to immortalize 
in Figaro, he offered his services to suppress a new pamphlet 
which he averred he had discovered in London, and this time 
against Marie Antoinette. The lieutenant of police, Sartines, 
accepted his offer. 

Beaumarchais immediately departed, and succeeded in obtain- 
ing by money from the enemy of the queen, the Jew, Angelucci, 
the edition published in England, had it burned, also bought and 
destroyed a new edition published in Holland, and was preparing 
to return to Paris when he learned — we are following his ver- 
sion — that Angelucci had deceived him and had kept a copy of 
the pamphlet. He flew after him, followed him across Germany, 
overtook him in a wood near Nuremberg, and after wanderings, 
perils, fights with robbers, whose details do more honour to his 
imagination than his veracity, he obtained possession of the copy. 



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BEAUMARCHAIS. 1 23 



Then instead of returning to Paris, he went to Vienna, where 
he wished, so he averred, to have an expurgated edition of the 
libel published, as the original text might produce too painful an 
impression on the new king, but where in reality he proposed to 
exploit his service, true or false, to the daughter of Maria Theresa. 
He pushed his audacity so far as to be presented to the empress, 
and read her the pamphlet ; but here his awakening began. Maria 
Theresa was indignant at the calumnies published against the vir- 
tue of her daughter. She was broken-hearted at the indecent slan- 
der which went so far as to allege that the queen would lend herself 
to a criminal intrigue, as the king was not able to have any chil- 
dren. But she was not at all grateful to Beaumarchais for his 
discovery; she looked upon him as a miserable impostor, and 
the Prince von Kaunitz even suspected him of being the author 
of the libel. He was thrown into prison, then, on a demand from 
France, released ; they were even forced to give him an indemnity 
of a thousand ducats, but at the same time signifying to that 
** rogue," as Kaunitz called him, to that " intriguer," as the em- 
press said, to decamp as soon as possible. Beaumarchais de- 
parted at once, but this discomfiture in no wise lessened his 
audacity ; he returned to Versailles and demanded the price of 
this undertaking. Whoever may have been the author of this 
libel, — whether it was Beaumarchais, as Kaunitz believed ; or 
some friend of Madame de Marsan, as Maria Theresa suspected ; 
or the Due d'Aiguillon, as Mercy would seem to insinuate, — the 
historian must take notice of this first and Machiavelian tentative 
against the reputation of the queen. It was the beginning of that 
tortuous and hidden power which had sworn to overthrow her, 
and kept its word, and which the goodness of Marie Antoinette 
could never disarm. 

The king, with that openness which refused to believe in the 
baseness and wickedness of men, only laughed at what he called 
the escapade of the impudent fool Beaumarchais. But the queen 
did not take the affair as tranquilly as her husband ; she was pro- 
foundly hurt by the attack on her reputation. But, strong in the 
testimony of her conscience and in the purity of her life and 
intentions, she soon forgot the mysterious episode, and with a 
goodness which was imprudent, even became the protectress of 
the man who had been so actively and in so cowardly a manner 
involved in the miserable intrigue. 

An instance better known, and a more patent grievance, was 



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124 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

soon to give a motive, or at least a more special pretext, to the 
complaints of her enemies at court, where everything was a sub- 
ject of vexation. For some time there had been a question of 
the brothers of the queen making a journey to France ; first 
Joseph II. had had the idea, then the youngest son of the em- 
press, Maximilian. The latter was then, under the direction 
of the Count von Rosenberg, visiting Germany and the Low 
Countries to complete his education. 

He was a prince eighteen years of age, of a genuine goodness 
of disposition, but with awkward manners, limited intelligence, 
and little education. Maria Theresa recognized this herself, 
when she recommended him to make strenuous efforts to acquire 
that amiability and easy politeness in the world, which, she said, 
** you entirely lack." " He will not shine after his brother," she 
wrote at a time when the' coming of Joseph II. was to have 
preceded that of Maximilian. 

But the queen, who had seen none of her family for four years, 
could not know that her brother was so near her without wishing 
to see him in Jrance ; the king seconded the invitation of his 
wife, and the journey was determined upon. 

On Tuesday, Feb. 7, 1775, the Archduke Maximilian arrived 
at La Muette, where his sister awaited him. The reception of the 
royal family was cordial. The king desired that every effort 
should be made to amuse his young brother-in-law, and the queen 
had undertaken to see to it With the authority which the differ- 
ence in their station gave her, she treated her brother as her 
child ; she was anxious that he should carry away a good impres- 
sion of France, and make a good impression himself. Unfor- 
tunately it chanced otherwise. 

In order to avoid all dispute on the subject of precedence and 
etiquette, the archduke travelled under the name of the Comte de 
Bargau ; but this very precaution became the source of a thou- 
sand annoyances. On the pretext of the incognito of Maximilian, 
the princes of the houses of Orleans, Cond^, Conti, claimed that 
he should visit them first; the archduke refused. The queen 
took the part of her brother with warmth, and had a very lively 
interview with the Due d'Orl^ans. " The king and his brothers," 
she said to him, " have not been so fastidious. Setting aside the 
rank of the archduke, you should have seen that the king treated 
him as a brother, and that he has had him to sup in private with 
the royal family, — an honour to which I presume you would never 



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MISTAKES OF ARCHDUKE MAXIMILIAN. 125 

have aspired. My brother will be sorry not to see the princes, 
but he is at Paris for only a short time, and has many things to 
see ; he can dispense with it." 

In order to efface this disagreeable impression, the queen re- 
doubled her attentions to Maximilian ; and some young people of 
the highest fashion — the S6gurs, the Durforts, the La Marcks 
— united to give a magnificent entertainment to the archduke in 
the stables of the king. With kindly tact the Comte de Provence 
and the Comte d'Artois wished to put themselves at the head 
of the organizers and to bear all the expense. The entertain- 
ment took place on February 27, and cost one hundred thousand 
livres. The riding ring was brilliantly decorated ; the ball-room 
was made to look like a fair, with seven covered streets laid out 
in it, bordered by booths, ca{6s, and spectacles ; Gluck's comic 
opera, " Le Poirier ou TArbre Enchant^," was given. There was 
a ball with Hungarian and Flemish quadrilles, supper, play, and 
everything that was necessary to occupy and amuse one during 
eight hours. 

But all these splendours did not succeed in effacing the bad 
impression made upon the public. Whatever Mercy may say, 
the French princes — and it is a friend of the queen who says 
it — were in the right; and although Marie Antoinette had no 
intention of wounding them, and with her indulgent kindness, 
which was the basis of her character, received them some days 
after with great cordiality, they resented the support which she 
had given to her brother's pretensions. 

They exaggerated and made malicious comments on the mis- 
takes which this brother committed; they remarked that he 
seemed indifferent to all the scientific or artistic wonders which 
were shown to him. Notably they recalled how on his visit to 
the Jardin du Roi at Paris, when Buffon, who did the honours of 
the place, presented his works to him as a mark of homage, he 
had only answered with excessive politeness, " I should be very 
sorry to deprive you of them." They affected to applaud to 
exaggeration the Due de Chartres, who, as a beginning to that 
annoying and systematic opposition to the court which was to 
carry him so far, made a point of showing himself in public in Paris 
during the entertainments at Versailles, from which he was ex- 
cluded. The jests at the brother turned into complaints against 
the sister. They regarded as a crime of leze-nation the vivacity, 
perhaps imprudent, of her very naitural affection ; and the name of 



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120 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

" Austrian," invented by the jealousy of Madame Adelaide, passed 
from mouth to mouth, summarizing in this word, suited to catch 
the popular imagination, the accusation against the queen of sac- 
rificing everything to her country and family. 

And yet no accusation was ever more unjust. Without enter- 
ing here into the details which we shall take up later, it is suffi- 
cient to recall that upon twenty different occasions Maria Theresa 
reproached Marie Antoinette for forgetting her country and 
family, for losing its traditions and customs, even its awkward- 
nesses, for being almost ashamed of being German, for neglecting 
the Germans, for showing them " little cordiality or protection." 
" German blood runs in your veins," she cried in her semi-German 
speech; ** do not be ashamed of it." Joseph II. addressed to his 
sister the same reproaches as her mother; he found her too 
French. When Maximilian and Rosenberg went to Versailles, 
he wished to recommend them to speak only German to her. 
Hindered in this project, whose realization, it must be said, would 
have been a supreme breach of etiquette, he had written the 
queen a letter in German ; and this woman, who is accused of hav- 
ing heart and thought only for her native country, had so far for- 
gotten her mother tongue that she was obliged to get Mercy to 
translate the emperor's letter, to such a degree had she lost the 
habit, not only of speaking German, but of feading it, writing it, 
and understanding it. Yet this could not stop calumny, nor 
hinder the courtiers from maliciously calling Trianon " Little 
Vienna." 



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CHAPTER XL 

Coronation of the King. — Celebrations at Rheims. — Emotion of 
THE Queen; her Letter to the Empress. — Marriage of Ma- 
dame Clotilde.— Renewed and Vain Efforts to recall Choi- 
SEUL. — Trial of the Comte de Guines. — Exile of the Due 
d'Aiguillon. — Nomination of Malesherbes. — Reforms of Tur- 
GOT; Complaints which they Aroused. — Fall of Turcot.— The 
Share which the Queen had in it. — Letter of Mercy to Maria 
Theresa. 

ON June 5, 1775, Louis XVL left Versailles, accompanied by 
the queen, Monsieur, Madame, and the Comte d*Artois, 
on his way to Compiigne, where he arrived at ten o'clock in the 
evening. On the 8th he left Compiigne to sleep at Fismes ; on 
the 9th he took the road to Rheims. He went there to receive 
the benediction of his crown, and the solemn consecration of the 
title which he held from his ancestors, and the visible sign of that 
grace of God in the name of which he reigned. The coronation 
was, in France, a national tradition ; the people found in the oaths 
which the monarch took a recognition of his rights ; and if certain 
philosophers like D'Alembert and Condorcet, carried away by 
their sceptical passions, only saw in it "a bizarre and absurd 
ceremony," entailing " the most useless as well as the most ridicu- 
lous of useless expenditures," personages not less celebrated, and 
whom we cannot accuse of superstition, like Mirabeau, wrote, 
" The grandest of all events for a people is without doubt the 
inauguration of their king. It is then that Heaven consecrates 
our monarchs and strengthens in some way the ties that bind 
us to them." 

Mercy would have wished to have the queen crowned at the 
same time as the king. It seemed to him that under the circum- 
stances, and Marie Antoinette not being a mother, the divine 
blessing would give her in the eyes of the nation the aureole with 
which maternity had not surrounded her. 



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128 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

A brochure^ written by a priest of the oratory, proved that the 
consecration of the queens had been a constant custom to the 
time of Marie de M^dicis, and that if it had fallen into desuetude 
it was only because neither Louis XIII. nor his successors had 
been married at the time of their coronation. Mercy, who, if he 
were not the instigator of this brochure^ was at least the ardent 
propagator of it, got Vermond to talk to the queen, and took care 
that the manuscript was given to the Due de Duras, and by the 
Due de Duras to the king. But the queen remained sufficiently 
indifferent to the overture, and the king did not seem affected by 
it. Did his affection for his wife have to contend against consid- 
erations of economy, which had already deferred the ceremony 
for a year? Or was it circumvented by Maurepas, incessantly on 
guard against anything that might strengthen the power of the 
young sovereign? However that may be, Marie Antoinette was 
present only as a spectator at the coronation of her husband. 
While the king made his entrance in a coach eighteen feet high, 
received from the hands of the Due de Bourbon, governor of 
Champagne, the keys of the city, and was himself received by the 
archbishop of Rheims at the door of the cathedral, where was 
solemnly chanted the Te Deum, the queen left Compifegne in the 
evening of the 8th with only Monsieul", Madame, and the Comte 
d'Artois, and arrived incognito in the city of the coronation at 
one o'clock in the morning. But in default of official compli- 
ments, she received popular acclamations. On one of those 
beautiful moonlight nights when the silver light is particularly 
luminous and soft, an immense crowd congregated on the high- 
ways and at the gates of the city to witness the arrival of the wife 
of the king. The enthusiastic vivats greeting her passage alone 
broke the silence of the night, which filled the soul with peace, 
and with sweet and pure emotions. On the following morning, 
in despite of the incognito, all the nobility of the city and sur- 
rounding country thronged the apartments of the archbishop's 
palace, where the queen was lodged, and departed enraptured 
with the grace and amiability of the young sovereign. In the 
afternoon there was a similar ovation; it was to the cries of 
" Long live the queen ! " that she traversed the streets of Rheims 
on her way to the intendance, to witness the entrance of the 
king ; and in the evening the clergy and the corps de ville came 
to offer her an address, to which she replied with discretion and 
amiability. 



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CORONATION OF THE KING. 129 

On Sunday, the nth, at six o'clock in the morning, the canons, 
in their copes, entered their stalls in the choir of the basilica; 
they were soon followed by the archbishop, the cardinals, the 
ministers, etc. At half-past six the lay peers took their places. 
At seven o'clock, the king, led by the bishop-duke of Laon and the 
bishop-count of Beauvais, arrived at the cathedral. After being 
addressed on the threshold by the Cardinal de la Roche-Aymon, 
who felicitated him on having all the virtues, and in particular 
the love of order, he entered the ancient edifice to the noise of 
popular acclamations ; and the archbishop, after having admin- 
istered to him the oath on the Book of the Gospels, poured on 
his head, breast, and shoulders some drops of the holy oil, which 
had been solemnly carried from the Abbey of St. Remy by 
the grand prior, wearing a coat of cloth-of-gold, and mounted 
upon a white horse covered with a housing of cloth-of-silver 
richly embroidered. The king was then invested with the 
royal cloak, and received from the hands of the archbishop 
the crown, the sceptre, the main de justice y and the sword of 
Charlemagne. Then, followed by the peers and high officials, 
he was conducted to the throne, raised upon the rood-loft; after 
which the archbishop and the peers gave him the kiss of peace, 
saying, " Vivat rex in (Etenmmr The multitude who filled the 
galleries echoed these words. Immediately the doors were 
thrown open, and the people pressed into the basilica with cries 
of joy. 

The queen, from the tribune, followed all the phases of the 
ceremony. At the moment of the crowning and throning, 
touched to the heart by the beauty of the church rites, and still 
more by the popular acclamations, which interrupted the order 
of them and emphasized the details, she could not control herself, 
and shed abundant tears. Her emotion was so great that for a 
moment she was obliged to leave her place. When she reap- 
peared an instant later, her eyes still wet with tears, the king 
looked at her affectionately, and a visible air of content spread 
Itself over his face. Despite the holiness of the place, the church 
resounded with cries and clapping of hands. All present were 
touched, and tears ran from many eyes, which caused those of 
the queen to flow afresh, 

Louis XVI. had forbidden them to drape the streets along his 
route, in order, he said, to see and be better seen by his people. 
On the very day of the coronation, at seven o'clock in the evening, 
VOL. I. — 9 



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I30 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

the king, with the queen on his arm, went in his ordinary costume, 
and without other following than the captain of the guards and 
a few police officers, to walk in the long wooden gallery which 
served as passage between the archbishop's palace and the 
church. There were many people in the gallery, and a great 
many without. The king forbade them to drive any one out, 
or to hinder any one from approaching. The populace, happy 
and grateful, pressed about the royal couple, from whom they 
were only separated by a low balustrade. During more than an 
hour the king and queen remained thus lost in the crowd, re- 
sponding with great grace to their demonstrations, allowing 
themselves to be addressed and looked at, and showing to each 
one marks of kindness. It was the queen who had first sug- 
gested this promenade; the public knew it, and thanked her for 
it by their acclamations.* 

When we think that these popular acclamations were manifested 
in the midst of universal contempt; that bread was dear; that the 
reform measures of Turgot, adroitly used by his enemies, had 
excited uneasiness on all sides ; and that two months before, riots 
had broken out at Dijon, at Versailles, and at Paris, — we do not 
know which to admire the more under the circumstances, the obsti- 
nate attachment of the nation to its princes, which might have 
been so great a power in the hands of clever ministers, or that in- 
credible fickleness of the French character which passes so easily 
from enthusiasm to anger, and which with young and inexperi- 
enced sovereigns like Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette, with 
light-minded ministers like Maurepas, or one who disdained ob- 
stacles like Turgot, became so formidable a danger. The queen 
did not hide it from herself, and if her happiness were complete, 
her confidence was not without alloy. 

'* It is a very astonishing thing, and a fortunate one at the same time," 
she wrote to her mother, " that we should have been so well received two 
months after the revolt, and despite the deamess of bread, which unfor- 
tunately continues. It is a marvellous trait in the French character to 
allow itself to be so easily carried away by evil suggestions, and to return 
to the good so quickly. Truly, in seeing these people, who in their mis- 
fortune have treated us thus well, we are the more obliged to work for 
their good. The king seemed to me to be penetrated by this truth. As 
for me, I know that I shall never forget the day of the coronation during 
my whole life, if it should last two hundred years. My dear mamma, 
who is so good, would have shared our happiness." 



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MARRIAGE OF MADAME CLOTILDE. 131 

The ceremony lasted four days. On the 12th the regiment of 
hussars of the Comte Esterhazy went through some manoeuvres 
at a short distance from the city, which the queen and Madame 
witnessed. On the 13th the king was solemnly made grand 
master of his order, and afterward held the chapter. On the 
r4th, according to an ancient custom, he betook himself on 
horseback to the Abbey of St. Remy, there heard mass, and 
on leaving the church, touched more than two hundred sick per- 
sons in the park, to whom he ordered alms to be distributed. 
The queen went to a private house to witness the passage of the 
procession. In the evening the young couple drove in a car- 
riage, amid the vivats of the people, round a beautiful prome- 
nade which encircled the city. But it was everywhere the queen 
who attracted attention. ** She has borne herself on every occa- 
sion," Mercy wrote, ** with dignity, amiability, and grace ; and if 
the homage which has been rendered to her has been extraor- 
dinary and universal, it is certain that never was homage better 
deserved." 

On the i6th the court returned to Compi^gne; on the 19th, 
to Versailles. 

New festivals there awaited them. On February 12, the king 
had announced the marriage of his sister Clotilde to Charles 
Emanuel of Savoy, prince of Piedmont, oldest son of the king 
of Sardinia. On August 21, the marriage was celebrated in the 
chapel of the chateau. There was a public dinner, games of 
chance, a ball at the court, and a ball at the house of the Comte 
de Viry, ambassador from Sardinia. With what brilliancy the 
queen appeared at these fiteSy Walpole has told us in a letter 
which we have quoted above. There was on seeing her a general 
cry of admiration. 

On the 28th Madame Clotilde said farewell to her French 
family and set out for Turin. Her departure was no great grief 
to the queen. For a time while she was still dauphiness, she had 
been sufficiently intimate with her young sister-in-law, whose 
sweet and kindly nature she appreciated ; she had been present 
at balls in her apartment, or at representations of small comedies, 
which had been an amusement and had served to complete their 
education. But their intimacy had not lasted long. Soon, under 
the influence of her governess, Madame de Marsan, who was in 
name and heart ** her dear little friend," the young princess had 
become estranged from her royal sister-in-law. After the death 



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132 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

of Louis XV. Madame Clotilde had lived apart, and her marriage 
left no void at the court. We should say rather that it was a 
relief to Marie Antoinette, as it put an end to the duties of 
Madame de Marsan, and thus diminished the importance of a 
woman who had always shown herself, and still showed herself, 
one of her most implacable and dangerous enemies. 

The queen at that time, moreover, was preoccupied with other 
things. At the instigation of the friends of Choiseul, with whom 
she was surrounded, and despite her mother, who feared for the 
Austrian policy the activity and clear-sightedness of the former 
minister, she was contemplating having him recalled to court. 
At the time of the consecration, Choiseul, in the rank of chevalier 
of the orders of the king, had gone to Rheims, and the queen had 
granted him an audience. She had done more ; and with femi- 
nine diplomacy, which she boasted of in a regrettable letter to 
the Count von Rosenberg, and which drew upon her the just re- 
proaches of Maria Theresa, she had found means to make Louis 
XVL himself fix the hour of the audience. The affair was soon 
known to the public, and the reinstatement of Choiseul in the 
council was looked for. He himself affected an air of confidence ; 
" he sniffed the air,'* as a chronicler has said, " in a way charac- 
teristic of his audacious genius." " I dare say," Marie Antoi- 
nette wrote on her part, ** that old Maurepas was afraid of being 
sent to take a little rest at home." But was such indeed the 
intention of the young sovereign? 

Had she not wished simply to bestow a mark of public favour 
on the man who had negotiated her marriage? Had she not 
contemplated asking advice from a man to whom no one denied 
intelligence, or did she put such confidence in him that she wished 
to further his views? If such were her intention, her plan failed. 
The king persisted in his coldness and in his dislike ; the queen 
herself was sufficiently ill pleased with her interview, in which 
Choiseul showed himself to be selfish rather than loyal, and re- 
fused to lend herself to certain of his insinuations, and the fallen 
minister returned to his retirement never to leave it again. 

The queen, nevertheless, continued to be surrounded by the 
friends of Choiseul, to submit to their influence, and to espouse 
their quarrels ; it would seem as though she regarded this as a 
debt of gratitude. She had lately given a striking proof of this 
to the eyes of all, in the trial of the Comte de Guines. This 
Comte de Guines, ambassador to London, after having been min- 



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TRIAL OF THE COMTE DE GUINES. 133 

ister to Berlin, — a man of intelligence, amiable, but ambitious 
and unprincipled, an intimate friend of Choiseul, — had been ac- 
cused of smuggling into England under cover of his ambassador's 
franks, and of having speculated at the Bourse by means of infor- 
mation which he had received from his official position. He 
threw all the blame upon his secretary. Tort de la Sonde ; but 
the latter proved that he had acted only under the command of 
his chief. The case was carried before the Parliament of Paris ; 
it was an event ** Every one is interested in this affair, — some 
from friendship, others from curiosity," wrote Madame du 
Deffand, who was not less interested than every one else. The 
Due d'Aiguillon, incidentally involved in the debate, used all his 
power against Monsieur de Guines, who, on the other hand, was 
supported by all the friends of Choiseul. It was correspondence 
against correspondence, requisition against requisition, memoir 
against memoir. The queen, won over by those around her, 
declared for the ambassador, and did so with all the passionate 
ardour she brought to her friendships. The Comte de Guines 
had thought it necessary for his justification to insert in the me- 
moirs written in his favour certain passages from his former 
ministerial correspondence. Monsieur de Vergennes refused to 
allow him to do so, alleging that if he granted any such demand, 
the secrecy necessary in the affairs of State would be violated, and 
that no foreign minister would again dare to make confidential 
communications to the ministers of France. The council unani- 
mously upheld the decision of Vergennes; but the queen, urged 
by her friends, used such persuasion with the king that, despite 
this vote, the permission solicited was granted. A little later, a 
memoir of the Comte de Guines having been suppressed by a 
decree of the council of State as libellous against the Due d*Ai- 
guillon, the king, at the instigation of the queen, nevertheless 
sent word to the ambassador that he might make use of the me- 
moir which had been suppressed, and to the judges that they 
should give heed to :t. Finally, in the beginning of June, 1775, 
the case was adjudged ; Tort de la Sonde was sentenced as ca- 
lumniator to make honourable reparation to his former chief be- 
fore twelve witnesses, and the ambassador returned in triumph to 
take possession of his post. 

At the same time the Due d'Aiguillon, who had made great 
preparations to go to Rheims as captain of the light horse, was for- 
bidden to be present at the coronation, and was ordered to retire 
to his estates of Guyenne. ^ j 

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134 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

" This departure is altogether my work/' Marie Antoinette wrote to the 
Count von Rosenberg. **The measure was full; that wicked man had 
maintained all sorts of espionage and evil report. He had sought to 
brave me more than once in this affair of Monsieur de Guines ; immedi- 
ately after the sentence I requested his withdrawal of the king. It is true 
that I did not ask for a Uttre de cachet ^ but nothing is lost ; for instead of 
remaining in Touraine, as he wished, he has been requested to continue 
his route as far as Aiguillon, which is in Gascony." 

The king had not shown any reluctance to exile the Due d'Ai- 
guillon, who was in his eyes the last representative of the odious 
cabal of Madame du Barry. This interference of the queen in 
the quarrels of the court was none the less to be regretted ; it 
made her descend from her serene throne, from the height of 
which a sovereign should soar above all party factions, to throw 
the weight of her name and personality into the struggles of 
every day ; she made adversaries of all the enemies of her friends. 
This first step was to carry her further, to an action more serious 
and more grievous ; after having made the mistake of taking part 
in this trial, she was to make the more serious mistake of inter- 
fering between the king and his ministers. 

The progressive cabinet, of which the appointment of Turgot 
had been the signal and the beginning, was finally completed by 
the nomination of the Comte de Saint-Germain in the place of 
the Mar^chal du Muy, who had died in frightful agony, and of 
Malesherbes in the place of the detested Due de la Vrilli^re. 
" Although he is hard of hearing," Marie Antoinette wrote jest- 
ingly of this latter, ** he has none the less heard that it was time 
for him to go before the door was shut in his face." 

The public applauded these appointments, and the queen either 
had no share in them, or had herself approved them. She had 
desired Sartines rather than Malesherbes ; and it is certain that 
the talents of the former lieutenant of police seemed to fit him 
for that place in the household of the king. But after her first 
impulse of anger she had made the best of it, and had received 
the new minister graciously; she had lent herself with the great- 
est good-will to the reforms of Turgot. She herself, at the 
beginning of her reign, had urged economy in the maintenance 
of the court, had forbidden gold and silver ornaments, and 
consented, without the least difficulty, to the reductions made 
in her household ; she had even, it was said, approved of the 
changes which the Comte de Saint-Germain had made in the 



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REFORMS OF TURCOT. 135 

army, although her knowledge on this point could not have been 
great. 

But these reforms could not be put into execution without 
wounding the vanity of some and injuring the interest of others. 
The ordinance of the Comte de Saint-Germain concerning the 
strokes with the flat of the sword had incensed the army. 
" Colonel," replied a grenadier to an officer, who tried to per- 
suade him that such a punishment had nothing dishonourable in 
it, ** in the matter of swords I only recognize the point." Tur- 
got's system of free commerce in cereals had excited revolts in 
different parts of France; they were obliged to employ force 
against these riots, and the discontented public avenged itself by 
singing couplets against the comptroller-general and his general, 
Jean Farine. Turgot*s other reforms excited no less dissatisfac- 
tion. The abolition of statute-labour, the suppression of the 
wardenships and masterships, were only enregistered by Parlia- 
ment with the solemn and sinister ceremony of a bed of justice. 
The President d'Aligre had protested against them with sombre 
energy. Public opinion became more and more hostile to the 
measures of the minister ; they were criticised in the salons, at- 
tacked in pamphlets, jeered at in song. More of a philosopher 
than a politician, Turgot, with his upright and somewhat naive 
disposition, with his stiff and uncompromising character, was not 
disturbed either by the criticisms, the attacks, or the songs. 

" He saw everything as an abstraction, and disdained to turn 
his attention to facts," so wrote a man who loved him much. 
** He paid no attention to the country which he ruled, to the 
century in which he lived, to the established institutions, the 
ordinary customs, to prejudices and interests. . . . He wished to 
govern according to theory, regarding man only as an intelligent 
being, and not as a creature led by his emotions and passions." 
He did not destroy obstacles as Richelieu would have done, nor 
push them aside as Mazarin would have done; he ignored them, 
and even seemed not to see them. The fleeting enthusiasm for 
the novelties of Turgot, a competent judge has said, soon gave 
place to irritation because Turgot was, as we say to-day, an in- 
transigeant. He beat his head against the i5rejudices of his time, 
managed no one, the king as little as others, and finished by set- 
ting the whole world against him. Here is what the ambassador 
from Sweden, the Count of Creutz, stated in the letter he wrote 
to Gustavus in. on March 14, 1776, two days after the bed of jus- 



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136 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

tice which had seemed to sanction the triumphant minister: 
" Monsieur Turgot finds himself opposed by a most formidable 
league, composed of all the nobles of the kingdom, of all the 
Parliaments, of all the financiers, of all the women of the court, 
and of all the cUvots^ 

It is not astonishing that in hearing round her this ever-swell- 
ing concert of complaints, the queen should have thought in 
good faith that she was following public opinion in pronouncing 
against the minister who was the object of such universal dislike. 
She thought also that she had a personal grudge against him. 
The Comte de Guines had won his suit before Parliament; he 
had not won it completely before the minister. In the beginning 
of 1776 he was recalled from his mission to London. His friends 
were fire and flame ; the queen, indignant at the disgrace of a 
man whom she had honoured with her protection, accused Ver- 
gennes, Malesherbes, and, above all, Turgot, whose hostile atti- 
tude toward the ambassador she knew, of his undoing. She 
resolved to avenge herself, and to obtain a double and striking 
reparation. Instigated by her friends, encouraged by Maurepas, 
who in his heart began to be afraid of the storm gathering on all 
sides against Turgot, and who was not sorry to be delivered from 
a colleague who had grown to be embarrassing, she succeeded in 
persuading the king to take up the quarrel. On May 10 the 
Comte de Guines received the following note : — 

" When I sent you word, Monsieur, that the time which I had fixed 
for your mission was over, I also said that I should reserve to myself the 
pleasure of granting you the reward which you deserved. I do justice to 
your conduct, and accord to you the honours of the Louvre, with the 
permission to bear the title of duke. I do not doubt, Monsieur, that 
these favours will but serve to redouble — if that be possible — the zeal 
which you have shown in my service. You may show this letter." 

It was the queen who had requested this note ; it was even she, 
so it is asserted, who dictated it. In the heat of her anger, she 
had desired that this official rehabilitation of the ambassador 
should coincide with the fall of his adversaries, and that Turgot 
should be sent to thfe Bastille. Mercy succeeded in preventing 
this outrage; but on May 12 Maurepas signified to the comp- 
troller-general his dismissal. 

The public, so it is asserted, was less shocked at this inter- 
ference of the queen than struck by the cleverness which she had 



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MERCY'S LETTER TO MARIA THERESA. 137 

shown in the affair. It admired her diplomacy and did not doubt 
her power. His overthrow, however, was none the less unfor- 
tunate, and the part which Marie Antoinette took in it, despite 
the wave of opinion which had seemed to urge her on, still more 
unfortunate. Perhaps she regretted it ; in any case she showed 
some embarrassment, for in her correspondence with her mother, 
she sought to deny all connivance at the dismissal of Turgot 
and Malesherbes. But she had not been able to resist the insinu- 
ations of those about her. 

" Your Majesty will without doubt be surprised," Mercy wrote to Maria 
Theresa, " that the Comte de Guines, for whom the queen can have no 
personal affection, is yet the cause of such great events ; but the key to 
the enigma lies in the persons about the queen, who are all united in favour 
01 the Comte de Guines. Her Majesty is possessed ; she tries to free her- 
self ; they succeed in piquing her vanity, in irritating her, in defaming 
those who for the general good oppose her wishes ; all this is accomplished 
during her promenades or other pleasure-parties, in conversation at the en- 
tertainments of the Princesse de Gu^m^n^e ; finally, they succeed so well in 
keeping the queen beside herself, in enervating her with dissipation, that 
joined to the extreme condescension of the king, there are at certain times 
no means of making her listen to reason." 

These lines of Mercy are serious ; they paint darkly, no doubt, 
but at bottom with but too great truth, an unhappy period in the 
life of the queen which we will call the period of dissipation. It 
would seem that, dazzled by the glory of the throne she had just 
ascended, intoxicated perhaps by public applause, possessed 
— to use Mercy's term — by those about her who took advan- 
tage of her youth, Marie Antoinette only saw the smooth side of 
life, which had too early opened before her. Maria Theresa was 
right in saying that it would have required six more years to 
confirm in the queen that reserve and reflection which we have 
seen growing, and for maturity of age to have brought that of 
reason with it. This too early possession of absolute power by 
sovereigns who were so young and so new came to spoil every- 
thing, and to make everything precarious. There followed dur- 
ing some years flights of thoughtlessness, inordinate love of 
pleasures which were lawful beyond doubt, but " hazardous," as 
the emperor said, — even imprudent acts, which are to be re- 
gretted, if you will, but of which we must not exaggerate the im- 
portance, and for which we must seek the causes. 



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CHAPTER XII. 

Period of Dissipation. — Horse-Races. — Hunts in the Bois de 
Boulogne. — Sleigh-Rides. — Visits to Paris. — Balls at the 
Opera. — The Adventure of Monsieur. — The Queen in a Cab; 
her Neglect of Etiquette. — The Unfortunate Conde- 
scension OF THE King. — Expenditures of the Queen ; her 
Jewels. — Play. — The Bankers at Fontainebleau. — Despite 
Everything the Queen remains Faithful to her Habits of 
Piety. — What Mercy thinks of the Character and Conduct 
of Marie Antoinette during this Period. — Opinion of the 
Prince de Ligne. — Opinion of the Count von Goltz. — A Page 
from the Comte d*Haussonvill£. 

THE last days of the reign of Louis XV. had been sad. Marie 
Antoinette, who had held aloof from the amusements of 
the king, owing to her antipathy to Madame du Barry, hardly 
daring to organize even private amusements with the young royal 
family for fear of seeming to condemn those of the old monarch, 
and living apart in the society of shrewish and bitter old maids 
and a lady of honour with no ideas save those concerning eti- 
quette, — Marie Antoinette had been obliged to curb and restrain 
her lively and youthful impulses. When at the age of nineteen she 
ascended the throne and became suddenly free to do as she liked, 
with a husband who was almost as young and as inexperienced as 
herself, who could afford her no guidance, and whose character was 
even less decided than her own, it would seem as if her repressed 
nature underwent a spontaneous reaction ; the sap of her youth, 
which had been checked, began to flow, and spread in all its exu- 
berance. Condemned during four years to an official ennui, 
the queen seemed to be starved for pleasure and distraction. 
There were not lacking persons at the court who shared with 
Marie Antoinette this thirst of amusement; and among these the 
chief was her brother-in-law, the Comte d'Artois. The Prince of 
Youth, as he was called, constituted himself in a way the organ* 
izer of his young sister-in-law's entertainments. 



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HORSE-RACES. 139 



There were, first, horse-races, — a new pleasure recently im- 
ported from England. Anglomania was then the fashion. In spite 
of the cutting reply which Louis XV. had made to the Comte de 
Lauraguais, many of the young nobles, like the Comte d'Artois, 
the Due de Chartres, the Due de Lauzun,nhe Marquis de Con- 
flans, were eager to introduce English customs into France. The 
first race took place on March 9, 1775, on the plain of Sablons; 
a horse belonging to the Due de Lauzun carried off the prize. 
The queen was present, " beautiful as the day," as Matra said, 
and the day was superb ; she came with Monsieur, Madame, and 
the Comtesse d'Artois. Other races followed this, then became 
a regular amusement, which took place every week in the en- 
virons of Paris, and for which the young sovereign acquired an 
" extraordinary taste ; " but this amusement was not without its 
drawbacks. The freedom of the races authorized a reprehen- 
sible familiarity. A sort of platform had been raised for the 
queen, whence she overlooked the track; here the principal 
amateurs gathered ; and these amateurs, carried away by their 
ardour, did not always preserve that form which was proper. 
They entered the pavilion in boots and morning dress, to the 
horror of serious-minded people. There would be a whole troop 
of young people there, ** improperly dressed," as Mercy said, 
making such confusion and noise that one could not hear one's 
self speak, and in the midst of them the royal family, almost lost 
in the crowd, without any distinction whatsoever, — the Comte 
d'Artois running up and down, betting, lamenting noisily when 
he lost, giving way to a joy not less noisy when he won, darting 
down among the people to encourage the postilions or jockeys, 
and returning to present to the queen the one who had won the 
prize. The queen might try in vain to preserve in the midst of 
this promiscuous crowd an air of dignity which would lessen the 
impropriety of the procedure ; the public was unable to appre- 
ciate so fine a distinction, and only saw the familiarity which 
seemed to preclude respect The king had not been able to 
bring himself to witness more than one of these diversions ; he 
did not dissemble his displeasure, and the queen herself was sen- 
sible of the impropriety of these English importations ; but led 
on by her ardour, she did not always make her conduct accord 
with her sentiments. 

At other times there were cabriolet- races, or deer-hunts in the 
Bois de Boulogne with the Comte d'Artois. The hunt ended 



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140 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

with a dinner in a house in the wood. The queen undoubtedly 
was never present at these repasts, which public rumour censured 
as too gay. However, they saw her in Paris driving with her 
brother-in-law in the little open carriages in which the count 
drove himself, and every one regretted that she should associate 
herself so openly in the pleasure-parties of a prince whose frivolity 
was so severely condemned. 

The year 1776 brought other diversions. The winter was ex- 
ceptionally severe ; snow covered the ground for more than six 
weeks. Marie Antoinette, who recalled the pleasure she had 
taken in her youth in sleighing, wished to enjoy that amuse- 
ment once more. It was by no means a novelty at the court 
of France : in the stables at Versailles were found old sleighs 
that had been used by the dauphin, father of Louis XVI. ; but 
new ones were made, more appropriate to the fashions of the 
day, and the queen, accompanied by the Princesse de Lamballe, 
both of them charming in the furs that enveloped them, glided 
over the ice with the chief lords and ladies of the court. She 
hesitated to go to Paris, she said, ** for fear of being annoyed by 
fresh scandal." The first excursions were made in the park at 
Versailles; the sound of the sleigh-bells which ornamented the 
harness of the horses, the elegance and whiteness of their plumes, 
the variety in the form of the various sleighs, the gilt with which 
they were decorated, all combined to make a charming spectacle 
for the on-looker. This success was encouraging; they pushed 
on to the Bois de Boulogne ; once they went as far as Paris, trav- 
ersing the boulevards and some of the streets. As the ground 
was slippery and covered with frost, and likely to occasion many 
falls, Marie Antoinette, from kindness of heart, had desired not 
to be escorted by her guards ; but the public, not understanding 
her humanitarian motive, and being accustomed to see their sov- 
ereigns surrounded by pomp and magnificence, regarded Marie 
Antoinette's too simple equipage as a crime. The queen knew 
it : in the following years she seldom went sleighing ; and when, 
in 1778, she returned once to Paris, it was with a numerous suite, 
in excellent order, and accompanied by the whole court in 
twenty-one sleighs. 

The queen loved Paris ; she loved its spectacles, its diversions. 
It pleased her to take part in them ; and the Parisians, in the 
beginning at least, were delighted by her frequent appearances, 
as they kept the actors on the alert and forced them to perfect 



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BALLS AT THE OPERA. 141 

their art The queen went to the Colis^e with Monsieur, with- 
out diamonds or head-dress, and allowed herself to be approached 
by every one, and the public applauded. She went to the Palais 
Royal to a fancy-dress ball given by the Due de Chartres ; but 
this time the public complained : it was not the custom for the 
queen to accept an invitation to a ball given at the house of the 
Due d'Orleans. The king had given her permission to go, al- 
though he would not go himself. In particular the queen went 
to the balls at the opera. These were then the meeting-place 
for people of fashion ; the nobles and the ladies of the court as- 
sembled there in domino and amused themselves by mystifying 
one another. Marie Antoinette took great pleasure in this her- 
self. " In order not to be known," the Prince de Ligne relates, 
— " which she always was, both by us and by all Frenchmen, 
even those who knew her least, — she addressed herself to for- 
eigners, in order to puzzle them, hence a thousand adventures 
and a thousand lovers, English, Russian, Swedish, and Polish." 

The queen never went alone to these balls ; she was always 
accompanied either by her suite or more usually by the princes 
or princesses of the royal family. An officer of the guards re- 
mained near her ; one of her ladies was by her side ; and if it 
happened that she walked for an instant with a man, it was always 
with a person of distinction. The king appeared but rarely at 
these balls; and while he encouraged his wife to enjoy such 
amusements, he seldom took part in them. On one occasion 
Madame, with her Italian cunning, pretended at the last moment 
to be indisposed, in order not to go with her sister-in-law. The 
queen then went with Monsieur, and the public cavilled ; they 
spared the young princess neither malicious criticisms nor direct 
reproaches. On another, a mask was bold enough to approach 
her and blame her laughingly for failing in her duty as a good 
wife, who should remain at home with her husband and not go to 
balls without him. The freedom of this sort of entertainment 
gave rise to inconveniences which might have passed unnoticed 
in another country, but which, Mercy rightly declared, were to 
be feared in conjunction with the lightness and frivolity of the 
French. 

One day at the opera the queen wished to go about in the 
crowd ; in order not to betray her incognito, she ordered the 
chief of her guard to follow her at a distance of ten steps, and 
she advanced with Monsieur and the Duchesse de Luynes. A 



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142 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE- 

mask in a black domino brushed roughly against Monsieur, who 
pushed him aside with his fist. The mask complained to a ser- 
geant, who was about to arrest the prince, when the officer ex- 
plained who he was. This incident, very simple in itself, gave 
birth to the most ridiculous stories. The most ordinary circum- 
stances were immediately travestied, and seldom with good-will. 

** The absurdity of the lies that are told here about everything 
is beyond belief," Mercy wrote. The persons who had no other 
means of livelihood but writing pamphlets filled them with a mass 
of anecdotes, invented at pleasure for the most part, but which, 
finding a semblance of truth in the excursions to Paris and appear- 
ances at the balls, gained credence in the salons and assured the 
circulation of the leaves abroad. The scandal-mongers delighted 
in them; and thus grew up about the name of Marie Antoinette 
an evil legend, which, propagated by court hatred, nourished by 
pamphlets, repeated in the memoirs of her implacable enemies, 
and exaggerated by party passion, has been handed down to us, 
and is even yet, despite the clearness of the truth and our knowl- 
edge of history, hardly dissipated, — so difficult is it to destroy 
calumny in France. 

What has not been said, for example, about the adventure of 
the cab, as it is called? Here is the adventure in all its sim- 
plicity: — 

It was in 1779, three years after the incident we have just re- 
lated ; the queen still retained her taste for the balls at the opera, 
and the king had come to share it. The two had gone together 
on the evening of Shrove Sunday to the ball, and after remaining 
till morning in the ball-room without being recognized, had re- 
turned to Versailles alone together. They had planned to return 
to the opera on the following Tuesday. Then at the last moment 
the king had changed his mind and persuaded the queen to go 
alone with one of her ladies of honour. The queen consequently 
set out alone with the Princesse d'Henin. On arriving in Paris 
she went to the house of her first equerry, the Due de Coigny, to 
take a private carriage, which would the better protect her incog- 
nito, and in this equipage she proceeded toward the opera. Un- 
fortunately the carriage was old ; it broke down at some distance 
from the opera. The queen descended with her lady of honour, 
entered the house of a silk merchant without unmasking, to wait 
while some one went in search of another carriage, and when 
none could be found, got into a cab which was passing, and thus 



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HER IMPRUDENCES. 143 

arrived at the opera. Some of her suite who had gone on ahead 
joined her and did not leave her again as long as she remained at 
the ball, where she was not recognized. Such is the story of the 
cab, according to the best-informed witnesses. - The queen was 
somewhat disturbed by it, but the king only laughed and made it 
a subject of pleasantry ; the pamphleteers alone, lovers and in- 
ventors of scandal, contrived to turn it into calumny. 

It is none the less true that these visits to Paris, these appear- 
ances at the balls at the opera, were productive of real inconven- 
ience. The queen, strong in the testimony of her conscience and 
purity of her intentions, only saw therein an innocent pleasure 
and a diversion without consequence. Mercy judged more clearly 
when he made some serious observations to the young princess on 
the subject of these frivolous pastimes. They were indeed but 
insignificant errors, but they made an unfortunate impression. 
The queen, with her native benevolence and easy affability, tdked 
to every one ; and there resulted an appearance of familiarity 
which somewhat compromised her dignity and shocked the pub- 
Kc, unaccustomed to such behaviour. One grew accustomed 
little by little, even in the most solemn functions and with the 
best intentions, to ignore the high rank of the sovereign, who 
seemed to wish to forget it Tierself. Familiarity killed respect. 
" Ever more jealous of her sex than of her rank,** Rivarol has 
rightly said, " she forgot that she was born to live and die upon 
a real throne ; she was too desirous of enjoying that fictitious and 
fleeting empire which beauty gives to ordinary women, and 
which makes them queens of a moment." 

We must not, however, blame the queen alone for these im- 
prudences. Louis XVI. should bear his share of the responsi- 
bility, which was, perhaps, greater than hers. Head of the family 
and of the State, it was for him to realize the harm that these 
visits to Paris might do his wife ; it was for him to warn her of it, 
and, if need were, to forbid these diversions, innocent in them- 
selves there is no denying, but which laid her open to criticism. 
He did not do so ; far from that, not only did he sanction these 
amusements, but he was the first to urge Marie Antoinette to 
enjoy them ; and when Maria Theresa, alarmed for the reputa- 
tion of her daughter by the rumours which arrived from Paris, 
echoed from Vienna the severe observations of Mercy, and wrote 
that these amusements, " wherein the dear queen appeared with- 
out her sisters-in-law and the king, caused her many anxious mo- 



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144 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

ments," the young woman had the right to reply that the king 
knew and approved of them, and that she could not do wrong in 
yielding to the instances of her husband. 

'' Among the rumours which are spread to detract from the honour and 
consideration essential to the queen of France," Mercy wrote on Dec. 1 7, 
1776, ** there is one which is more dangerous and more unfortunate than 
all the others. It is dangerous, because from its nature it must make an 
impression on all classes of society, and particularly on the people ; it is 
unfortunate, because after deducting all the lies and exaggerations insepa- 
rable from public rumour, there remain nevertheless many very authentic 
facts to which it would have been better if the queen had never given any 
pretext The queen is censured quite publicly for making and being the 
occasion of considerable expenditures. This cry will continue and increase 
if the queen does not immediately adopt some principle of moderation on 
this article. It only began after the death of the late king ; but it has 
already grown to great dimensions.'' 

Strange that Marie Antoinette as dauphiness had never shown 
any taste for extravagance 1 She had even seemed rather to lean 
toward a somewhat strict economy. '* There is no instance/' the 
ambassador wrote, " when Madame the Dauphiness has of her 
own accord exhibited any marked liberality." A year later he 
again observes with chagrin that " Madame the Archduchess has 
never given any indication of a disposition toward generosity," 
and he asks himself, not without uneasiness, to what use he can 
put the thousand louis which the empress had authorized him to 
put at the disposition of her daughter. When she ascended the 
throne, Marie Antoinette could with justice boast of never having 
made any debts. At the beginning of her reign she had shown 
herself resolute to avoid all useless and superfluous expense, and 
she had given up without regret amusements which were likely 
to become expensive and embarrassing. Soon, however, dazzled 
by her new grandeur, and led on by her friends, she threw her- 
self into the vortex of pleasures and luxury. As dauphiness she 
had spent little on her dress ; and though she loved jewels, we 
have seen her refuse the diamond ear-rings which Madame du 
Barry offered to persuade Louis XV. to buy for her. Once upon 
the throne, her taste for stones asserted itself forcibly and irresis- 
tibly. In January, 1776, she bought somt girandoles worth four 
hundred thousand francs, and it was necessary to ask the mer- 
chant for a delay of four years to pay the full price. Six months 
later she bought bracelets at two hundred and fifty thousand 



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HER JEWELS; HER PLAY. I4S 

livres. " This purchase/' Mercy said, ** was determined upon 
because certain persons about the queen tempted her, and because 
of her protection granted to certain jewellers." But this time her 
purse, already drained by the acquisition of the girandoles^ was 
wholly insufficient. It was necessary to meet the deficit; some 
jewels were sold ; then the queen with extreme repugnance de- 
cided to demand two thousand louis from her husband. The 
king made some remarks, but gave her the sum. Maria Theresa 
was less patient; she addressed some lively reproaches to her 
daughter. 

" These anecdotes cut me to the heart, above all, for the future," 
she wrote to her, in her vigorous and incorrect style. " That re- 
lating to the diamonds humiliated me. This French frivolity and 
passion for all these extraordinary ornaments ! My daughter, my 
dear daughter, the first queen, is she to grow to be like this? The 
idea is insupportable to me." 

The queen was piqued by these reproaches. " So my bracelets 
have reached Vienna," she said angrily, on reading her mother's 
letter. " I wager that this information came from my sister Marie." 
Not knowing what to reply, she affected to turn the affair into a 
jest, and treated the purchase of the bracelets as a trifle. The 
empress replied warmly. ** You pass very lightly over the brace- 
lets," she said, " but the affair is not such as you wish to make it 
seem. A sovereign lowers herself by decking herself out, and still 
more if she pushes it to such considerable sums, and at such times! 
I see but too often this spirit of dissipation ; I cannot remain silent, 
loving you for your good, and not to flatter you." 

Maria Theresa was right ; her language was severe, but this 
severity was legitimate, and her fears were but too well founded. 
Behind these excessive expenditures we see appear in the future, 
like a threatening phantom, the law-suit of the necklace. 

After the purchase of the diamonds came her play. Here also 
the queen suffered herself to be led on. As dauphiness she had 
exhibited a sufficiently strong repugnance to this kind of amuse- 
ment. Even as queen, she had for a long time refused to play. 
Then the taste was born in the companionship of her favourites, 
and by the example of the Comte d'Artois, and soon grew to be 
very lively. ** Her play has become very dear," Mercy wrote : 
** she no longer plays games of commerce, in which the losses are 
necessarily limited ; lansquenet has become her ordinary play, 
and sometimes faro. This play is not entirely public." The king 



VOL. I. — 10 

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146 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE 

disapproved of this high play, but they hid it from him. When 
he went to the house of the Princesse de Guim^n^e, they put 
away the cards a quarter of an hour before his arrival, then 
took them out again after his departure. They also played at the 
house of the Princesse de Lamballe. Louis XVI himself, with 
his too easy good-nature, sometimes lent himself to the vagaries 
of the companions of the queen; he contented himself with mak- 
ing fun of them rather than forbidding them. The public mur- 
mured, and the ladies of the court complained. 

Once during a sojourn at Fontainebleau, the queen was desir- 
ous of playing faro ; she requested permission of her husband to 
have some bankers come from Paris. The king made some objec- 
tions, representing the danger of authorizing by court example 
games which were forbidden by the ordinances of the police, even 
at the houses of princes of the blood ; then he yielded and granted 
the permission demanded, adding that it would be of no conse- 
quence if they only played during one evening. The bankers 
arrived on October 30 ; they cut all that night, and on the morn- 
ing of the 31st, at the house of the Princesse de Lamballe, where 
the queen remained until five o'clock in the morning, after which 
her Majesty had them cut again in the evening and well on into 
the morning of November i, All Saints* Day. The queen herself 
played until nearly three o'clock of that morning. It was unfor- 
tunate that they should have sat up so late on the eve of the sol- 
emn festival, as it occasioned public remark. The queen evaded 
the king's remonstrances by a jest, saying that as he had given 
permission for them to have a party of play, without determining 
the length of it, they had therefore the right to prolong it through 
thirty-six hours. The king laughed, and replied gayly, " Go to; 
you 're no good, none of you." He went further, and carried his 
weakness so far as to have the bankers return on November ii. 
Was it possible with such condescension to check a passion for 
play which deranged the finances of the queen and compromised 
her credit? 

Let us hasten to say, however, that in the midst of these 
excesses and of that society, still infested by the corruption of 
Louis XV., among that youth somewhat promiscuous and at times 
enterprising, whom such amusements attracted to Versailles qv to 
Fontainebleau, Marie Antoinette was able always to maintain an 
air which commanded respect and restrained all liberty of speech. 
The very ardour with which she gave herself up to frivolity did 



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MERCY'S OPINION OF HER CONDUCT. I47 

not debase her intelligence nor the foundation of her character ; 
and Mercy remained convinced that both the one and the other 
were naturally inclined to good, and would turn to it from prefer- 
ence in all tranquil and thoughtful moments, and that all the great 
qualities of the queen were only held in suspense by an inordinate 
dissipation, while all hope was not cut off of a more favourable 
return to her interests and to her honour. " To speak the exact 
truth," he said, " there is less to complain of in the evil which 
exists than in the lack of all the good that might exist." 

An extraordinary thing was that this passion for pleasure did 
not sensibly alter the basis of piety which the queen owed to the 
principles of her mother and to the instruction of her father ; and 
despite all the errors which the ambassador did not cease to point 
out to the empress, often with exaggeration, Marie Antoinette 
continued to give to the court an example of regularity in her 
religious practices ; and she often called a halt in the whirl of 
frivolity which we have just described, but of which we must not 
exaggerate the character. 

Some historians have tried to make use of certain imprudences 
to asperse the young woman, and, above all, of the so-called revela- 
tions due to the fatuity of certain men admitted to her intimacy ; 
people have talked of the loves of Marie Antoinette. True history 
has done justice to these calumnies. During this period of dissi- 
pation, from the point of view of morals she committed no error. 
" In all that concerns morality, there has never been in the conduct 
of the queen the slightest act which has not borne the imprint of 
a soul virtuous, upright, inflexible in all the principles which make 
for honesty of character. ... No one is more entirely convinced 
of this fact than the king." Such is the testimony which Mercy 
gives in the beginning of the reign of Louis XVI., and which all 
his later correspondence confirmed ; and such is the opinion ex- 
pressed later by a brother, Joseph II., who was severe and ill-dis- 
posed toward the queen, after having observed her closely and with 
a rigour that was almost malevolent. And after having scru- 
pulously studied the reports of the ambassador, of that faithful 
servitor and conscientious witness, who relates all, who even ex- 
aggerates the picture in order to provoke lively remonstrances on 
the part of the empress and serious reflections on the part of the 
queen, who hides none of her imprudences, and who would not 
have hidden her errors, if there had been any. but who did not 
discover one to point out to the solicitude of Maria Theresa, — 



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148 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

after having studied these reports, there is no impartial historian 
who will not agree with the words of Mercy and Joseph II., and 
who will not say with the eminent editor of Mercy's correspond- 
ence, that "we cannot descend in the future to repeating the 
evil reports, the calumnies, and the vulgar errors of Besenval, of 
Lauzun, and of Soulavie ; " not one who will not subscribe to 
these lines of one of the men who knew Marie Antoinette best : 

" Her so-called gallantry was never more than a sentiment of profound 
friendship, perhaps somewhat marked, for one or two persons, and a general 
coquetry natural to a woman and tb a queen desirous of pleasing every one. 
At the very time when her youth and lack of experience might have led us 
to take certain liberties with her, there was never one of us who had the 
happiness of seeing her every day who dared to be guilty of the smallest 
indecorum ; she acted the queen without being conscious of it ; we adored 
her without thinking of loving her.'' 

A man who saw Marie Antoinette as closely as the Prince de 
Ligne, without, however, belonging to her set, and who was with 
her to the end, the Baron d'Aubier, does not differ from that 
witty writer on this point: — 

" Had she ever remained upon the throne," he says in his somewhat 
stilted language, " one could easily have pardoned her for surpassing every 
one ; but having descended to the salons of friendship, the best of her 
friends, with all the pretensions of a French woman, only saw in her the 
rival who had snatched the sceptre of the salon from her. Antoinette was 
coquettish, without being gallant ; but those who would have pardoned her 
being gallant to excess could not pardon her for pleasing excessively. The 
coxcombs, repulsed with as much dignity as indulgence at the first word 
they ventured to utter, became the champions of the hatred of those 
ladies who consoled them, only because Antoinette was not what they said 
she was." 

The minister from Prussia himself, the Count von Goltz, so 
hostile to the queen and always on the watch for means to de- 
stroy her credit, and who declared that with malice the conduct 
of Marie Antoinette might be unfavourably interpreted, was 
obliged to acknowledge that no one could designate any person 
in particular, and that there was evident only a desire to please 
every one. 

Recently, again, a distinguished historian, on publishing and 
editing the reminiscences of his father, who was still young during 
the reign of Louis XVI., but who was a keen and sagacious ob- 



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A PAGE FROM D'HAUSSONVILLE. 149 

server, and even because of his youth more likely to see things 
as they were, as no one would mistrust him, has written the fol- 
lowing page, which completes and confirms the judgment of the 
Prince de Ligne : — 

" I have always heard my father say — and his memory of his youth was 
very exact — that the aspect of these assemblies at Trianon was most mno- 
cent , that the queen bore herself with grace and exquisite decorum , that 
between those women, most of whom were so young, and some most 
beautiful, and the small number of men admitted to theu: intimacy, the 
most perfect form always reigned. They affected to emancipate them, 
selves from etiquette because the queen desired it They pretended to 
treat her like any other woman, because this was an indirect way of pay- 
ing their court ; but the respect remained absolute beneath the assumed 
familiarity, and reserve was always evident beneath their feigned abandon. 
The queen was the only one who was deceived. She congratulated her- 
self with entire good faith on having introduced into the court of France 
the customs of debonair Austria. According to my father, in this very 
exclusive circle, composed of the most privileged and devoted of her inti- 
mates, her attitude was always that of a wife careful of her duties, attached 
to her husband, whose very serious surroundings inconvenienced her 
somewhat, and who sought near at hand, and with the least risk possible, 
the distractions natural to her age. Some men who passed for being 
agreeable, and were in the fashion, were little by little introduced there. 
They were well received by the queen ; but no one ever seemed to be 
particularly distinguished by her. Thus, much freedom, not a little giddi- 
ness, perhaps some coquetry, but a coquetry that was generally without 
aim, no appearance of deceit, no shadow of intrigue. So it seemed to 
my father ; that is to say, he never had any faith in the serious or frivo- 
lous attachments which have been attributed to the queen, Marie Antoi- 
nette. He treated such stories as foolish or stupid ; and it put him in a 
bad humour whenever any one appeared to believe in them." 

This page from Monsieur d*Haussonville leads us very naturally 
to a study of the real causes of this period of dissipation which 
we have described in the life of the queen. If the young and 
lively sovereign allowed herself during some years to be carried 
away by a thirst of frivolity and pleasure, which her true friends 
sought too often in vain to moderate, it is necessary to know by 
whom she was thus led and why. 



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CHAPTER XIII. 

The Companions of the Queen. — The Princesse de Lamralle; 
HER Appointment as Superintendent of the Household of 
the Queen. — The Comtesse de Dillon. — The Princesse de 
GuEM^NEE. — The Comtesse Jules de Polignac. — Favours 

GRANTED TO THE POLIGNAC FAMILY. — ThE PoLIGNAC SeT. — ThE 

Comte de Vaudreuil. — The Comte d^Adh^mar. — The Baron 
DE Besenval. — The Due de Guines. — The Due de Lauzun. — 
Foreigners. — La Marck — Esterhazy. — Stedingk.— Fersen. 
— Rivalry of the Favourites. — Decline in Favour of the 
Princesse DE Lamballe. — Increasing Influence of Madame 
DE Polignac; Disadvantages of this Influence. —The Queen 
cannot resist the Solicitations of her Friends. — True 
Causes of the Dissipation of Marie Antoinette. 

*' nr^HIS august princess/' Mercy wrote, " so interesting by 
X reason of the exceptional qualities of her mind and char- 
acter, would be irreproachable if left to herself; it is on her un- 
worthy surroundings that we must cast the blame, and I shall 
struggle against them to the last moment, with the same stead- 
fastness I have ever shown." 

It is time to present to our readers these companions of the 
queen whom the ambassador judged so severely, and who did so 
much harm to the unfortunate sovereign. 

While still only dauphiness, Marie Antoinette had noticed at 
the balls of her lady of honour, the Comtesse de Noailles, a 
young woman with large, tranquil eyes, long curling hair, a bril- 
liant complexion, an undulating, supple form, a sweet face, whose 
charm was increased by an aureole of misfortune. A wife at 
eighteen, a widow at nineteen, of the unworthy son of the Due 
de Penthi^vre, Marie Th^r^se de Savoie-Carignan, Princesse de 
Lamballe, had only known the disillusions and sorrows of mar- 
ried life. Hers was a delicate and tender heart, which knew only 
two attachments, — that to her father-in-law, whose old age she 
sustained, and whose charity she shared; that to the queen, to 



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MADAME DE LAMBALLE. 151 

whom in the days of trial she gave the most decisive proof of 
affection, the seal of blood. Marie Antoinette saw her, fell in 
love with her at first sight, charmed perhaps by the elegance of 
her bearing, a veritable type of grace, — for the queen was natu- 
rally attracted toward everything that was graceful, — charmed 
still more perhaps by her limpid gaze, the sensibility of her souf, 
and a certain melancholy and dreaminess that a life already so 
tried at so young an age had thrown round the young Italian, 
fair as any woman of the North. With affection confidence is 
born, and with confidence intimacy. The accession of the queen 
but strengthened these bonds; and in the winter of 1776, we find 
the two friends associated together in those sleigh-rides which 
at first amused Paris and then aroused its murmurs, — the two 
together mingling their freshness and their smiles, mingling 
in a way their curls and the sunshine of their gayety ; both hid- 
ing behind their thick furs the suppleness of their figures and 
the roses of their faces ; beautiful and radiant ** as the spring, 
beneath marten and ermine." 

The friendship with Madame de Lamballe was the only friend- 
ship of the dauphiness, the chief and longest friendship of the 
queen. During several years her influence was preponderant; 
and whatever respect a devotion whose heroism was pushed to 
martyrdom may inspire, this influence was not always for the 
queen's good. Of a somewhat narrow mind, an honest but irri- 
table disposition, Madame de Lamballe more than once threw the 
court into a rage and angered the public by certain unwonted 
pretensions, and by her ambition either for herself or her relatives. 
Her brother, the Prince de Carignan, obtained, thanks to her, a 
pension of thirty thousand francs and a regiment of infantry, to 
the great displeasure of the minister, who was not consulted, and 
to the officers who aspired to the rank of colonel. She herself, 
six months later, was made superintendent of the household of 
the queen, the Comtesse de Noailles, whose husband had been 
made Marechal de Mouchy, having resigned under pretext of ac- 
companying her husband to his new post as governor of Guy- 
enne, but really from jealousy of the increasing influence of the 
favourite. Marie Antoinette, who saw without regret her lady of 
honour retire, whom she had never loved, hastened to profit by 
her departure to obtain from the king the re-establishment of the 
office of superintendent, for the benefit of Madame de Lamballe. 
" Judge of my happiness." she wrote to the Count von Rosenberg; 



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IS2 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

" I shall make my friend happy, and I shall rejoice in it even 
more than she." But the re-establishment of an office which had 
been suppressed for more than .thirty years could not but be the 
cause of serious inconvenience, at the very moment when reforms 
in the matter of economy were being undertaken. The pay of 
fhe superintendent was originally fifteen thousand livres, and 
thirty thousand extra for the maintenance of a table at court 
The last incumbent, Madame de Bourbon, had found means, 
through the influence of her father, and on various pretexts, to 
raise this figure to fifty thousand ^cus, equivalent to one hun- 
dred and fifty thousand livres The Princesse de Lamballe claimed 
a similar compensation; and Maurepas, who saw therein a means 
of making himself agreeable to the queen, urged the king to grant 
the request of Madame de Lamballe ; the salary of the new 
superintendent was fixed at fifty thousand ^cus. 

To limit the prerogatives of the office which had been re-estab- 
lished presented no less difficulty. Certain of the privileges were 
exorbitant. To cite only one, no lady of the queen could exe- 
cute an order given by her without first obtaining the consent of 
the superintendent. They tried to reform this abuse: a new rule 
was made by the Ahh6 de Vermond ; but Madame de Lamballe 
refused to submit to it, alleging that her father-in-law would not 
consent to have her accept an office stripped of its former privi- 
leges. The queen yielded to the solicitation of her friend, and 
all her household were incensed. The Princesse de Chimay hesi- 
tated to accept the place of lady of honour, the Comtesse de 
Mailly that of the lady of the bedchamber, because it seemed to 
them that the re-establishment of the office of superintendent 
would give to their positions but secondary importance. Marie 
Antoinette became vexed at seeing her favours thus hawked 
about ; she commanded Mesdames de Chimay and de Mailly 
submitted, but their displeasure continued. 

The drawbacks soon made themselves felt. The Princesse de 
Lamballe, who was very fond of ceremony, and the more jealous 
of her prerogatives as she felt them contested, often vexed the 
ladies of the queen ; especially were there continual disputes with 
the lady of honour and with the lady of the bedchamber. These 
incessant contentions, whose noise even reached the queen, fin- 
ished by annoying her; she was provoked with Madame de Lam- 
balle for being the occasion and cause of these quarrels, and her 
affection grew cooler. She sought other friends. For a while 



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MADAME DE GU£m£n£E. IS3 

her taste inclined to a young woman of Irish origin, the Com- 
tesse de Dillon ; large and well-made, although somewhat thin, 
Madame de Dillon had a charming face, and a sympathetic voice, 
which seemed to reflect the sweetness of her soul. Marie Antoi- 
nette was attracted by this sweetness; but soon the indiscreet 
demands of the new favourite, who was urged on by an intriguing 
mother, Madame de Roth, estranged the queen, and she treated 
Madame de Dillon with only the ordinary kindness she showed 
to all ladies of the court. 

The favour of the Princesse de Gu6m<Jn6e was more lasting. By 
her birth, she was daughter of the Prince de Soubise ; by her 
office, she was governess of the Children of France, although the 
queen was not yet a mother ; as successor to her aunt, the Com- 
tesse de Marsan, Madame de Gu6m6n6e held great state at the 
court. She gathered about her a brilliant society, and Marie 
Antoinette took pleasure in going to her house to pass her even- 
ings. Mercy had in the beginning encouraged this intimacy; 
himself intimate with the princess, he could watch more easily all 
that passed at her house, and he saw therein, moreover, a coun- 
terpoise to the influence of Madame de Lamballe. The affections 
of his royal pupil would make him less uneasy if they were di- 
vided; they would lose in depth what they gained in extent 
But the companionship of Madame de Gu^m^n^e did not offer 
fewer drawbacks than that of the superintendent. If what one 
called the Palais Royal — that is to say, the Due de Chartres and 
his following — assembled at the house of Madame de Lamballe, 
the salon of the governess of the Children of France was the 
meeting-place for all the partisans of Choiseul. Her balls were 
noisy ; her play unbridled, and what was worse, suspicious ; her 
friends designing and indiscreet. This set was composed almost 
exclusively of young men, accustomed to free conversation, and 
given to a fault which is very dangerous in personages of high 
position, and to which the queen herself was somewhat inclined ; 
namely, that of casting ridicule upon men and institutions. Al- 
though by her bearing she exacted respect from all those who 
surrounded her, and restrained their freedom of language, Marie 
Antoinette felt the danger of this intimacy, and without giving 
it up completely, lessened the number of her visits to the 
governess. 

To say the truth, it was rather a thirst of pleasure than a liking 
for the individual that led the queen to the house of the daughter 



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154 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

of the Prince de Soubise ; it was policy which kept her there. But 
her heart alone ruled in a new friendship which was more durable 
than that for Madame de Lamballe, since it knew no eclipse, and 
was as profound, since like that it was only broken by death, — 
her friendship for Madame de Polignac. 

Married at seventeen to the Comte de Polignac, Gabrielle Yo 
lande de Polastron had lived for a long time at Claye in a semi- 
retirement not altogether distasteful to her, and necessitated by 
the condition of her fortune. It was only at the age of twenty- 
five, after the death of Louis XV., that she came to Versailles, 
whither her sister-in-law drew her, the Comtesse Diane de Po- 
lignac, who had been made lady-in-waiting to the Comtesse 
d'Artois; she appeared at the court, and was immediately re- 
marked. Her face of a perfect oval, save for the defective out- 
line and too dark colour of the forehead, her angelic features, her 
large blue eyes, her long brown hair, her charming mouth, her 
superb teeth, her well-turned neck and shoulders, her medium 
figure, which, however, seemed taller than it was in reality, gave 
her an air of grace rather than of beauty. A nose not altogether 
straight, without, however, being retrouss^, a profound gaze, 
wherein was reflected a narve astonishment, an enchanting smile, 
a certain nonchalant languor and careless attitude which recalled 
the Italian Morbidezza, and a simplicity full of naturalness, in 
striking contrast to the noisy pretension of the other ladies of 
the court, added to her mien something that was both alluring 
and piquant. ** Never did face promise more charm and sweet- 
ness than did that of Madame de Polignac," the Comte de la Marck 
said ; ** never bearing showed greater decorum, modesty, and 
reserve." " She had one of those heads," the Due de L^vis said, 
** such as Raphael painted, wherein he combined a spiritual ex- 
pression and infinite sweetness. Others might excite greater sur- 
prise and admiration, but one never tired of looking at her." 
She was not a witty woman, nor was she a learned woman; she 
was a woman of the world, who spoke little, was mistress of 
herself, and showed a constant loyalty to her friends, hiding per- 
haps beneath an apparent candour more tenacity dind finesse than 
appeared. 

Marie Antoinette saw the Comtesse Jules de Polignac at her 
balls, and then was surprised to see her no more. The countess 
replied that the smallness of her fortune did not allow her to live 
at court. This narve and clever avowal augmented the queen's 



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FAVOURS GRANTED TO THE POLIGNACS. 155 

interest : the sweet and gracious Madame de Polignac pleased her ; 
poverty-stricken, she pleased her still more. It seemed to the 
queen that here was an injustice of fate to be repaired. The re- 
served bearing, the modest tastes, the candour of the young woman 
attracted her: she thought she had found what she had so long 
sought, — a heart that would fully sympathize with her own, hating, 
as she did, pomp and pretension, susceptible alone to the charms 
of friendship. She resolved to bind the new-comer to her by the 
most indissoluble of ties, that of benefits, and to enjoy with her 
the supreme pleasure which she had dreamed of, — the calm and 
simplicity of private existence in the midst of the splendours of 
public life. If we may believe Madame Campan, Madame de 
Polignac, on the advice of her friends, had recourse to an ingeni- 
ous stratagem to inflame and fix the nascent affection of the 
young sovereign. A letter adroitly composed, a feigned depart- 
ure, similar to that of the nymph of Virgil, who allowed herself 
to be seen only to take flight, a touching explanation throwing 
the whole responsibility of the departure which afflicted Marie 
Antoinette on the exigencies of her fortune, which did not allow 
her to afford the expenses of life at Versailles, were resorted to, 
in order to soften the heart of the queen, and by assuring the 
predominance of the countess, to retain the Polignacs at court. 
However authentic this anecdote may be, it is certain that favours 
of all sorts soon rained upon the new favourite. The chief re- 
proach which history has addressed to Madame de Polignac is 
that she was lacking in disinterestedness, if not for herself, at least 
for her family and friends. 

Assuredly, as the Comte de la Marck has justly said, the high 
position which the countess soon held at court, the entertainments 
which she was obliged to give, the necessity of keeping a house 
which became for a time that of the queen, and where even the 
king himself sometimes appeared, necessitated expenditures which 
it would have been impossible for her to afford without large 
pecuniary advantages. A minister, an honest man and one eco- 
nomical of the revenues of the State, the comptroller-general, 
D'Ormesson, has acknowledged that in view of the great expense 
to which they were forced, the demands of the Polignacs were not 
excessive. But when we see them receive four hundred thousand 
livres to pay their debts,. eight hundred thousand for the dowry of 
their daughter, together with the post of captain of the guards for 
their future son-in-law, the Due de Guiche ; when we see them« 



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156 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

not content with such gifts, solicit the customs of the royal do- 
main, the earldom of Bitche, which was worth one hundred thou- 
sand livres a year, and in default of the earldom of Bitche obtain, 
on the 2d of June, 1782, the estate of F^nestrange, which brought 
in sixty or seventy thousand livres, then fifteen months later 
a pension of eighty thousand livres from the royal treasury, 
and finally on Jan. i, 1786, the general direction of posts and 
roads, — we begin to find these favours excessive, and their pre- 
tensions exorbitant. 

Nor was this all ; besides the pensions there were positions. 
The Vicomte de Polignac, father of Count Jules, a man of medio- 
cre capacity, was provided with one of the most desirable offices, 
the mission to Switzerland, to the detriment of the brother of the 
minister for foreign affairs, the President de Vergennes. The count 
himself received the reversion of the office of first equerry to the 
queen, with twelve thousand livres* pension, and the use of horses 
and carriages. This was an increase of nearly eighty thousand 
livres in the expenditures, at a time when it had been decided for 
economical reasons to suppress the reversions. It was, besides, 
a deception and insult to the then titulary, the Comte de Tessy, — 
who, according to custom, had the right to present his own suc- 
cessor, — and to the powerful family of Noailles, allied to Tessy; 
while the promise of the office of captain of the guards to the Due 
de Guiche, son-in-law of the countess, displeased the Cibracs. 

Maurepas, who, as an old courtier, worshipped the rising sun, 
countenanced out of policy the demands of the Polignacs. The 
queen interested herself from affection ; and though she often did 
not go so far as Maurepas ; although on various occasions it was 
the minister who despite Marie Antoinette forced the king's hand 
for the most exorbitant of these favours, — it was not the minisr 
tcr whom the public held responsible, but the queen. So many 
benefits conferred on one family (Mercy claims that in four 
years the Polignacs had obtained either from large salaries or 
other gifts nearly five hundred thousand livres of annual reve- 
nue) displeased not only the court, but the public. " Her Majesty 
thinks she is sacrificing to friendship," the ambassador wrote; 
" and the public only sees therein a blind passion for the Comtesse 
de Polignac." 

If Madame de Polignac had been left to herself, her influence 
would not have been dangerous. Being sweet and indolent, and 
sincerely attached to Marie Antoinette, she would have enjoyed 



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VAUDREUIL AND D'ADHfiMAR. 157 

Without ulterior motive an affection which she returned, and would 
not have undertaken solicitations which disturbed her tranquillity, 
and perhaps cost her heart a pang; but a set of young men and 
women grouped themselves about her, who made use of her 
favour and took advantage of her influence. Among these was 
her own sister-in-law, the Comtesse Diane de Polignac, who had 
been the instrument of her fortune by calling her to the court; 
a woman of intelligence, but designing and false, who, despite a 
doubtful reputation, succeeded in having herself appointed lady 
of honour to Madame Elisabeth. 

There was the Comte de Vaudreuil, whom public malice accused 
of being too intimate with the favourite, and who exercised an ab- 
solute empire over her. He had a good figure, elegant manners, 
was a good musician, a patron of the arts, which he cultivated 
himself, — one of those rare men, who, according to the saying of 
Prince Henry, " knew how to talk to women," but he was easily 
carried away by anger, going so far one day as to break the 
queen's ivory billiard-cue in a fit of temper over a ball pocketed 
with too great strength. Monsieur de Vaudreuil thus spoiled 
genuine talents by a violent and avaricious disposition. Of an 
absorbing personality, and aspiring to have a hand in everything, 
he stopped at nothing to obtain his end, and his end was usually 
his own interest. Thanks to his influence over the favourite, it 
was he who made up at will what was called the Polignac set, and 
who dispensed its offices and honours. 

There was the intimate friend of the Comte de Vaudreuil, the 
Comte d'Adh^mar, who was gifted with those superficial but 
brilliant qualities which succeed in the world, — wit, a charming 
face, and agreeable social talents. He sang correctly, played 
comedy well, composed pretty couplets. Moreover, he possessed 
an ardent ambition, audacity, and a great talent for intrigue. 
His marriage with a widow who was already old, but madly 
in love with him, — the Comtesse de Valbelle, a lady of the 
palace, — had brought him money; the friendship of Madame 
de Polignac made his political fortune. Already the French 
minister to Brussels* he wished to be made ambassador to Con- 
stantinople, then to Vienna; but Maria Theresa opposed this 
last appointment, and the queen refused to urge it. Defeated 
in this scheme, he did not regard himself, however, as beaten ; 
having been a subaltern during the Seven Years' War, he aspired 
to be minister of war. Again Marie Antoinette declared to 



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IS8 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

Madame de Polignac, who was pleading her friend's cause, that 
she must give up an object which for every reason was an im- 
possibility. She did not, however, withdraw her favour from 
Monsieur d'Adh6mar, and three years later he finally became 
ambassador to London. 

The Baron de Besenval was not less ambitious than the Comte 
d'Adh^mar, but his ambition was different. He did not aspire to 
be minister; he wished to make ministers. Thus he appears in 
his memoirs, and such was his real character, — a fool, vain, de- 
signing, caring much to possess favour, and still more to seem 
to possess it, indiscreet, a sceptic with regard to the disinterest- 
edness of men and the virtue of women, witty moreover, and to 
a certain degree attractive. Holding the rank of lieutenant- 
colonel of the Swiss Guards, the Baron de Besenval was more 
than fifty-five when he was admitted to Marie Antoinette's set. 
His air of good-nature, his affectation of simplicity, his amiable 
and often amusing conversation, his knowledge of the court, even 
his political aspirations, his fidelity to Choiseul, whom he did not 
cease to exalt, his adroit flatteries, disguised under an appear- 
ance of straightforwardness and independence, the cleverness 
and eagerness with which he encouraged the secret inclinations 
of Marie Antoinette and preached a contempt of etiquette and 
the sweetness of private life, promptly won him the sympathies 
of the young sovereign, whom, moreover, his white hairs re- 
assured. She believed in his merit and in his devotion, and for 
a time Besenval was the man in fashion, the ruler of the Polignac 
set ; he was the originator of all their plans, the leader of all 
their parties. It needed but little for the queen to look upon 
him as a guide for her youth ; she even allowed herself one day 
to show a confidence in him which with his habitual presump- 
tion Besenval hastened to abuse. But how could the queen mis- 
trust an old man of fifty-five, who might have been her father, 
and whom she treated, as Madame Campan has said, " like a brave, 
polite Swiss, of no great consequence " ? But a day came when the 
old man, believing everything permitted to him, wished to make 
use of the confidence which the queen showed him to wring from 
her a State secret. The queen, justly indignant at an insistence 
which became, to use Mercy's expression, '* an indecent persecu- 
tion," could not help showing him a marked coldness ; without 
banishing him completely from her presence, she exiled him for 
a time from her intimacy. Thus disappointed, he avenged him- 



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THE POLIGNAC SET. 159 

self for his deserved disgrace by inserting in his posthumous me- 
moirs libellous insinuations which happily the reputation alone of 
their author is sufficient to discredit. 

Messieurs de Vaudreuil, d'Adhemar, and de Besenval were the 
three principal leaders of the Polignac set; they were not, how- 
evcF, alone. Around these ruling stars were grouped numerous 
satellites, some of whom hoped to rule in their turn. Among 
these was the Due de Guines, whose trial we have previously 
described. Ambitious, designing, avaricious, in the midst of the 
American war, and despite the opposition of the minister of 
finance, he had found means to obtain one hundred thousand 
6cus as a dowry for his daughter, and the title of hereditary duke 
for his son-in-law, the Marquis de Castries ; though a personage 
of mediocre talent, he was able at that epoch, when genius was 
rare, and thanks to the support of a restless and clamorous fac- 
tion, to pass for a while for a statesman, and even aspired to 
the office of prime minister. His schemes were vast, his self- 
possession imperturbable, his warmth in defending his ideas 
catching. For a time the queen was taken by it. A letter from 
Maria Theresa, in confirmation of repeated observations from 
Mercy, opened her eyes. She saw the worth of her prot^g6; 
and without advertising a disgrace which would have seemed a 
disavowal, she treated him for the future with more coldness. 
The duke perceived it, and withdrew from the court. 

Besides these, there were the Due de Polignac, ** the husband 
of his wife," who, indeed, did not aspire to rule; and the Due de 
Coigny, appointed at the end of 1774 first equerry to the king, 
and, like the Due de Guines, a great partisan of Choiseul, — a 
proud and loyal character, to whom the queen was grateful for 
having refused to bend the knee before Madame du Barry; a 
man of perfect good-breeding, and of discretion beyond proof, 
but who was avaricious of favour to the point of taking umbrage 
at that of Madame de Polignac, and of putting himself for a 
moment in opposition to her. There were also : the Marquis de 
Coigny, son of the duke ; the Marquis de Conflans, son of the 
Mar^chal d'Armentiires, and brother-in-law to the Marquis de 
Coigny, a determined Anglomaniac, one of the most singular 
characters of the time, and one of those rare courtiers whom 
the king liked, because he was a good rider and bold hunter; 
the Comte and the Chevalier de Coigny, brothers of the duke, — 
the first a big, good-natured boy, the second a pretty man much 



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l6o LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

admired by the women, who called him " Mimi ; " the Bailiff 
of Crussol, serious even in his jesting; the Chevalier de Lille, 
a friend of the Coignys, and famed for his amiability, his wit, and 
his facility in turning agreeable couplets and satirical ballads; 
the Chevalier de Luxembourg, ambitious and wicked, according 
to Mercy, but whose favour was but fleeting; the Comte de 
Polastron, brother of Madame de Polignac, an excellent vio- 
linist; his wife, an accomplished beauty, whose somewhat care- 
less grace, and languishing head carried on one side, seemed 
made to inspire passion, and who did in fact inspire it; the Com- 
tesse de Chalons, n^e D'Andlau, a cousin of the favourite, and a 
friend of the Due de Coigny; the daughter of Madame de Po- 
lignac, the Duchesse de Guiche, to whom Grimm gallantly 
applied this line of Horace, — 

" Mater pulchra filia pulchrior ; '* 

and the beautiful and spirititelle Marquise de Coigny, who Sid not 
long remain loyal. Finally, the most brilliant and the most dan- 
gerous of all was the impetuous Due de Lauzun, a nephew and 
disciple of the Mar^chal de Richelieu, — brave as his sword, chiv- 
alrous as his race ; more proud of his exploits in gallantry than 
of his military feats ; intelligent but lacking in judgment; a liber- 
tine and crippled with debts, whose greatest virtue in the eyes 
of posterity is in having been the husband of that sweet and 
charming Am^lie de Boufflers, who, in that corrupt society and 
with a husband so little married, as he himself said, that it was 
not worth speaking of, preserved an irreproachable and dignified 
attitude, and left an untarnished reputation for faithfulness and 
virtue. This Due de Lauzun is the same who enjoyed during a 
time Marie Antoinette's favour, who aspired to direct her and to 
give her advice, who, after having dared in his incredible vanity 
to pose as the queen's lover and offer her a heron's feather which 
he had worn, pushed his fatuity so far as to make her a declara- 
tion, and who, thunder-struck by her energetic " Go, Monsieur ! " 
spoken in an indignant tone, left the palace with lowered head and 
rage in his heart. When, later, Lauzun became the Due de Brion, 
furious at this discomfiture and hurt at the constant coldness of 
the queen, who had been justly offended, and attributing to this 
legitimate anger the failure of his aspirations to succeed his uncle 
as colonel of the French Guards, he threw himself, out of ven- 
geance, into the Revolution, and after having been one of the 



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FOREIGN GENTLEMEN AT COURT. l6l 

most implacable enemies of Marie Antoinette during her life- 
time, became after her death the most odious and untruthful of 
her defamers. 

Then, again, among these great French nobles, but grouping 
themselves about Marie Antoinette rather than about Madame 
de Polignac, were the foreign gentlemen, — valiant young men 
who, fascinated by the irresistible attraction which France in the 
eighteenth century exercised over all polite societies, thronged 
from all parts of Europe, to seek amusement, and many of them 
a career, in the armies of the king and at the court of the queen. 
Among them was the Prince de Ligne, one of the most amiable 
and witty men of that time when there were so many amiable and 
witty men, — one of those who best appreciated Marie Antoinette, 
and who, according to his own expression, *' adored her without 
thinking of loving her." 

Another of these foreigners at the French court was the Comte 
de la Marck, Auguste d'Aremberg, a Belgian, like the Prince de 
Ligne, belonging, like him, to one of those princely families who 
served indifferently France, the Empire, and Spain ; French at 
heart, if not by birth, he was one of the most respectfully devoted 
in the days of good fortune, and one of the most faithful in mis- 
fortune. There too was the Comte de Valentin Esterhazy, whose 
favour alarmed Mercy and displeased Maria Theresa, — an honest 
character, who did not please by his looks, for he was very ugly, 
but by his good qualities, his frankness, his zeal, and his disinter- 
estedness ; who had the honour of being one of Marie Antoinette's 
correspondents, and the still greater honour of being one of her 
most active defenders in the hour of danger. In the same group 
was the Count of Stedingk, who owed to the personal recom- 
mendation of the king of Sweden, Gustavus III., his introduction 
to the court of France, and to his brilliant career in America his 
admission to the suppers of the queen ; overwhelmed by the 
bounties of that princess, he was not, however, ungrateful. Re- 
called in 1 78 1 by the king of Sweden, who had just declared 
war against Russia, Stedingk left Versailles with keen regret, 
which became even keener when he was retained in the service 
of his master on the confines of Europe at the beginning of the 
Revolution, and could not therefore fly to the succour of that 
queen whom he felt to be menaced more than any other, and of 
that France which he loved, as he said, " enough to drown himself 
for her." 

VOL. L — II 

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l62 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

Finally, the most attractive of all these figures was Fersen, who 
seldom frequented the salon of the Polignacs, for the reason, 
perhaps, that his chivalrous nature revolted against the petty 
intrigues which Messieurs de Besenval and de Vaudreuil were 
continually weaving. The Count Axel von Fersen, of a noble 
Swedish family, whose father was the chief of the party of the 
ChapeauXy or the French faction in Stockholm, had appeared at 
Versailles in the spring of 1774. Tall, with a distinguished bear- 
ing, a handsome face, which was regular without being expres- 
sive, with deep and somewhat melancholy eyes, of a serious 
character, having, as Monsieur de L6vis said, *' more judgment 
than wit," hiding a passionate soul under an armour of ice, 
and possessing to a supreme degree those qualities so rare at 
court, — namely, an extreme circumspection toward men and a 
rare reserve with women, — Fersen had attracted attention on his 
first appearance. " It is not possible," the ambassador from 
Sweden, the Count of Creutz, wrote, " to bear one's self more 
wisely or decorously than he has done." The dauphiness had 
admitted him to her receptions, and had conversed with him at a 
ball at the opera. The friends of Gustavus III., Mesdames de 
Brionne, de la Marck, and d'Anville, had received him with open 
arms. 

A second voyage in 1778 and 1779 established his reputation. 
Received with distinction in the principal salons, well treated by 
the royal family, Fersen saw his favour increase to such an extent 
that the courtiers took umbrage at it, and calumny fell upon it. 
They said that the queen had an especial liking for the young 
Swede; that she sought him out at the balls at the opera, and in 
her more intimate assemblies, and exchanged tender looks with 
him; that she always addressed a gracious word to him; that 
she had expressed a desire to see him in his national uniform, 
and that on learning of his departure for the war in America, she 
had not been able to restrain her tears. The truth is that Fersen — 
grateful for the kindly reception of the queen, for her charming 
attentions, and for her obliging remembrance of him, so com- 
mented upon by her contemporaries, which had made her cry on 
seeing him again in 1778, *'Ah, here is an old acquaintance!" 
— wrote to his father, ** She is the most amiable princess I have 
ever known," and as a result had conceived a respectful devo- 
tion to the sovereign, heightened perhaps by a discreet sentiment 
for the woman ; that on her side Marie Antoinette, having found 



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RIVALRY OF THE FAVOURITES. 163 

in this young man a solid character, a delicate reserve, and a disin- 
terested zeal, which she had found but too seldom among those 
about her, had been touched by it. To what degree? Fersen 
has taken care to determine it in the reply which he made to the 
Duchesse de Fitz-James on his departure. ** What, Monsieur, you 
are abandoning your conquest? " ** If I had made one, I should 
not abandon it; I depart free, and unfortunately leave no one to 
regret me." The queen herself unconsciously gave the lie to 
these injurious reports, when four years later she warmly but 
simply recommended Fersen to the king of Sweden, publicly 
speaking his praise, instead of maintaining with regard to him, 
as an historian has said, a reserve which would have been held to 
be significant. 

Some persons murmured at the preference which Marie Antoi- 
nette accorded to foreigners, and the Comte de la Marck per- 
mitted himself one day to say to her that it would do him harm 
in the eyes of Frenchmen. " What can I do? " she replied sadly ; 
" they ask nothing of me." 

Such were the principal members of what was called at first the 
Polignac set, and later the queen's set, when the salon of the favour- 
ite had become the salon of the sovereign. They composed an ex- 
clusive circle which permitted no division of favour, and which, 
to prevent all dangerous intrusion, tore to shreds all those who 
might aspire to rival them. ** Altogether," wrote one of the ladies 
of the court, who did not pass, however, for having an evil tongue, 
but who had had occasion to complain of their attacks, ** this 
famous set is made up of persons who are very wicked, and who 
display an incredible amount of arrogance and spite. They be- 
lieve themselves made to judge all the rest of the world. . . . They 
are so afraid lest some one should insinuate himself into favour 
that they rarely praise any one, but tear all to pieces at their 
ease. Yet we must bear this and say nothing." 

Madame de Lamballe also had her set. It was composed, 
Mercy said, of somewhat less illustrious conspirators ; otherwise 
there was no difference. There were to be found there, in com- 
pany with the Comte d'Artois and the Due de Chartres, the fol- 
lowers of the Palais Royal and the House of Orleans. Besides 
these, the habitues of the salon of Madame de Lamballe were not 
numerous ; the courtiers had promptly perceived that the wind 
did not blow from that quarter. 

A rivalry was soon established between the two favourites, and 



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l64 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

the queen found herself beset with insinuations of all kinds; but 
the issue of the struggle could not be doubtful. Naive and timid, 
with no resources of intellect to support the graces of her person 
and the tenderness of her heart, and a susceptibility which was 
easily wounded, what could Madame de Lamballe do against 
Madame de Polignac, who enjoyed the advantage of being a 
novelty, and who, besides her natural attractions, had the benefit 
of the experience of friends who had grown old in their pro- 
fession? The countess complained gently, respectfully, and ten- 
derly, gave signs of uneasiness and chagrin, and adroitly cast 
ridicule upon her rival, which, falling upon a mind naturally 
inclined to mockery, almost always produced its effect. Little 
by little Marie Antoinette came to laugh at her first friend. 
More open and less clever, Madame de Lamballe complained 
aloud, and sometimes with bitterness, and her complaints annoyed 
the queen. Too great frankness and openness rarely please at 
court ; hints and half-lights are more successful. The partisans 
of Madame de Polignac knew this well. They rarely attacked 
the queen openly; they surrounded her with an almost imper- 
ceptible network, in which in the end she found herself captive. 
They profited by all the mistakes of the superintendent, exag- 
gerated her faults, cried out against her pretensions, which in- 
censed the court, against her jealousy, which admitted of no 
rivalry, and emphasized her timidity, which they called her 
stupidity. Little by little the queen grew to dislike Madame de 
Lamballe, and without perceiving it herself, accustomed herself 
to do without her. 

The relation became strained between the two friends. Ma- 
dame de Lamballe, displeased, made an excuse to dispense with 
keeping open house ; it was pointed out to her that she should 
give suppers at least on the days when there was a ball. She 
yielded, but with repressed irritation, and as soon as occasion 
again offered, sought another excuse for remaining aloof. The 
coldness of the queen increased with what seemed to her the 
ingratitude of her friend ; and a day came when Madame de Lam- 
balle, feeling that she was only tolerated and that she was becom- 
ing an object of embarrassment and weariness, decided to leave 
the court, and no one sought to detain her. She retired to the 
neighbourhood of her father-in-law, the Ducde Penthi^vre, whose 
solitary life and good deeds she shared, and but rarely appeared 
at Versailles. But if she were lacking in intelligence, her heart 

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INFLUENCE OF MADAME DE POLIGNAC 165 

remained ever the same. Misfortune freed her affection of all 
that had seemed to be exacting and selfish in it during the time 
of prosperity. In the hour of danger she was not found wanting. 

The favour of Madame de Polignac increased with the decline 
of her rival. Her star rose alone and undimmed on the horizon 
of Versailles. The court flocked to her house ; and the Comte 
d'Artois himself, who had been for some time loyal to the super- 
intendent, joined the victorious party. To say the truth, the 
Comte d'Artois went wherever he could amuse himself; and the 
assemblies which Madame de Lamballe had refused to hold, and 
which had therefore been held at the house of the Princesse 
de Gu^m^n^e, began to take place in the salon of Madame de 
Polignac. The queen fell into the habit of going in the evening 
to her friend, and she even succeeded in leading the king thither. 
The court hastened to follow them there. They assembled in a 
large wooden hall, built at the extremity of a wing of the palace, 
which overlooked the orangery. At the end there was a billiard- 
table ; on the right a piano ; on the left a table of quinze. On 
Sunday there was a mob. " Does Madame de Polignac receive 
all France?" the Prince de Ligne asked the Chevalier de Lille. 
" Yes," the chevalier wrote in reply ; " three days a week, — Tues- 
days, Wednesdays, and Thursdays, from morning to evening. 
During these seventy hours there is a general ballet: who will, 
enters ; who will, sups. You should see how the rabble of court- 
iers flock there. They occupy during these three days, besides 
the salon, always full, the greenhouse, which has been made into 
a gallery, at the end of which is a billiard-table. During the 
four days that are not named above, the door is only open to us 
privileged ones." 

The prestige of Madame de Polignac did not decrease ; the 
queen could not do without her friend. She was the only person 
of those about her, Mercy has said, concerning whom it was im- 
possible for him to open the queen's eyes. She showed her in 
all places and at all times marked favour. In the evening she 
took her arm, traversed with her the antechamber, filled with 
people, without other following than a page and two footmen ; 
and this unwonted familiarity, the sign of an affection without 
precedent, caused those present to murmur. Did Madame de 
Polignac go to pass some time in the country, the queen wrote 
to give her news of Versailles. Was she ill, the queen went each 
week to see her. It happened that her illness was but the begin- 



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l66 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

ning of her pregnancy. It was decided that at the time of the con- 
finement of the favourite, the court should be established during 
nine days at La Muette. This time it was not only the court, but 
Paris that thought such demonstrations exorbitant. Rumour 
spread that Madame de Polignac made an immoderate use of her 
influence to enrich herself, as well as all her family ; and although 
a great deal of envy and a certain amount of exaggeration entered 
into these complaints, the details which we have given above prove 
that they were not without foundation. To crown all these 
favours, six months after her confinement Madame de Polignac 
received the honour of being allowed to sit in the presence of the 
king and queen, and her husband the title of hereditary duke. 
" There are few instances," Mercy wrote concerning this last event, 
** of a favour which has been so useful to a family in so short a 
time." 

The court murmured ; the public was displeased. The queen, 
wholly given up to her affection, saw neither the displeasure of 
the court nor of the public. The kindness of her heart, the desire 
to please those whom she loved, and a strange timidity in so great 
a princess, an invincible repugnance to say no, an infinite weakness 
in yielding to the counsels of those whom she believed to be 
attached to her, left her without defence against the importunities 
of her friends. It was only necessary to insist with some obstinacy 
for her to yield. Mercy complained as early as 1772 of this re- 
grettable weakness. ** Those who have sufficient boldness to dare 
to weary her with their importunity," he wrote, " are almost sure 
of gaining an ascendancy over her ; and even when she has no 
affection for them, and recognizes the injustice of their demands, 
she often yields to them solely out of fear." Age had not cor- 
rected this unfortunate disposition ; and what was still more vexa- 
tious was that in proportion as the queen was timid in the face of 
solicitations, to the same degree was she importunate in her de- 
mands for her friends. Lively and ardent, she caught fire imme- 
diately on the presentation of a request, without concerning herself 
sufficiently to consider its extent, and the rights of the person who 
made it ; and when she had once taken a thing to heart, her in- 
stances were so pressing, the idea of her power so great, that not 
only did ministers not dare to refuse, but it chanced that they 
sometimes even exceeded her intentions. 

Madame de Polignac, and especially her friends, soon discov- 
ered this weakness, and made use of it to their profit. If the 

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CAUSES OF HER DISSIPATION. 167 

queen knew not how to resist their appeals, she could still less 
resist their tears ; and it was this last means to which the favour- 
ite resorted when she encountered in her royal friend a firmness 
upon which she had not counted. Before this supreme assault 
the queen always capitulated. It happened sometimes that she 
grew impatient; nor did she deny the drawbacks of her surround- 
ings in her conversation with the faithful counsellors whom her 
mother had placed near her. Her affection for her friends did 
not lessen her perspicacity ; with her keen intelligence and clear 
judgment she saw their faults as quickly as she was seduced by 
their virtues; but their virtues made her too easily ignore their 
faults, whose consequences she did not sufficiently calculate. 
"She overlooks everything," Mercy wrote in 1776, at the time of 
her greatest frivolity, — **she overlooks everything in those who 
can make themselves useful to her in her amusements." She was 
happy only in those salons where the subject of the conversation 
was within her comprehension ; where all concerned themselves 
to amuse and divert her ; where they flattered her tastes, and, 
above all, her weaknesses; where she was indemnified, as she 
thought, for the weariness which she endured during the rest of 
the day. If she sometimes withdrew from these companions, she 
always returned. And thus the time passed in vain if not in 
dangerous conversations, in games of cards, in races, in piquant 
and often cutting pleasantries ; and there was none left for seri- 
ous occupations, for reading, for reflection, for that travail of the 
soul which gives birth to great thoughts, and prepares one for 
great deeds. 

Was it, then, only a thirst of pleasure which attracted Marie 
Antoinette to the society of her favourites, and urged her to form 
and constantly strengthen these ties? Assuredly this motive was 
present; there was also that desire for activity so natural in a 
princess of nineteen ; the sap of her youth, which had been held 
in check during the last years of the reign of Louis XV., when 
it was once free spread in all its luxuriance. But she was also 
urged by a nobler sentiment, — the need of loving and being loved 
for herself, a thirst of affection which was not satisfied in her home- 
life. The king was kind, often thoughtful toward his wife ; Mercy 
declared one day that he was in love with her. But it was with a 
cold, timid, and embarrassed love, which ill responded to her heart 
of twenty, full of fire and tenderness. This warmth of sentiment, 
this expansiveness, which she did not find in her husband, Marie 



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l68 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

Antoinette sought in her friends ; and lacking love as she under- 
stood it, she wished at least for friendship in its fullest extent. 

To this reason, besides, there was joined another of a more 
private nature. There was in the life of the queen a sad void, 
which filled her with unspeakable grief. The passion for amuse- 
ment which consumed her was often but an extreme need of dis- 
traction, an irresistible desire to escape the weariness which 
devoured her. Her amusements were but a veil thrown over a 
grief which she would not avow, and her smiles often hid bitter 
tears. We know to-day — the reports of Mercy establish it on 
each page — the delicate situation in which Marie Antoinette was 
placed during seven years by the strange coldness of her hus- 
band. She wore the crown of France, but she sighed in vain for 
that crown of maternity which adds so pure a radiance and so 
noble a dignity to the forehead of twenty. This was the most 
subtle of dangers for a young wife, as well aS the most poignant 
grief. The vigilant solicitude of Maria Theresa became alarmed. 
The public blamed the queen for the situation which was so pain- 
ful to her, and for which she was not responsible ; it could not 
pardon her for allowing the Comtesse d'Artois to outstrip her in 
that mission, altogether royal, of giving heirs to the throne. 

" The almost certain pregnancy of the Comtesse d'Artois," Mercy ^Tote, 
" gives but too many subjects for disagreeable reflections, and I am really 
disturbed for the effect which it may in the end produce in the heart of 
the queen. However brilliant her position may be at this moment, it will 
never be solid until this august princess has given an heir to the State. 
Until that time, so much to be desired, the very advantages which the 
queen enjoys entail certain drawbacks ; her influence, her power, disturb 
a nation which is petulant and light, and which fears to be governed by 
a princess who lacks the virtue of being a mother in order to be regarded 
as a Frenchwoman." 

This situation, which was so perilous and so false, was bitterly 
resented by Marie Antoinette ; and it was to distract herself — she 
even owned it one day to Mercy — that she threw herself into 
this vortex of amusement. Finding neither in the life at court, 
nor, above all, in her private life, the satisfaction which she had 
dreamed of, she expended upon the friends of her choice the 
ardent and expansive affection which she missed in her husband, 
and which she could not spend on the fair heads of children, whom 
she so dearly loved. Such is the true explanation of the dissipa- 
tion, apparently inexplicable, of Marie Antoinette during the first 



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DEVOTION TO HER CHILDREN. 169 

years of her reign, and her enthusiasm for her favourites. If 
some of this still remained after the birth of her first child, it Wcis 
because one cannot break in a day the habits and friendships of 
many years; but in proportion as the wave of maternal love 
rose in her heart, her wasted hours gave place to serious ones, 
the preoccupation of the education of her children succeeded to 
her desire for amusement; and the queen little by little withdrew 
from the salons of her friends, to remain by the cradle of her 
children, and prepared herself by the joys of maternity for the 
struggle and the bitterness of her later ordeal. 



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CHAPTER XIV. 

Trianon. — The King gives the Queen Little Trianon. — The 
Chateau. — The Gardens. — The Exotic Trees. — The River. — 
The Theatre. •— The Temple of Love. — The Belvedere. — The 
Grotto. —The Hamlet. — The Dairy. —Travellers' Opinions 
OF Trianon. — Arthur Young. — The Russian Karamsine. — 
The Baroness von Oberkirche. — The Prince deLigne. — The 
Apartments : the Dining-Room ; the Little Salon ; the Bath- 
Room; THE Boudoir; the Queen's Chamber. — Marie Antoi- 
nette AND THE Arts. — The Marie Antoinette Style. — The 
Queen's Apartments at Fontainebleau. — Life of the Queen 
at Trianon. — Entertainments in Honour of Illustrious Visi- 
tors. — Marie Antoinette and Literature. — Music. — GlucR 
and Piccini.— Gr6try. — Salieri. — The Theatre. — The Queen's 
Company. — Comedy at Trianon. — The Expenses of Trianon.— 
The Disadvantages of Trianon. 

TO this select and exclusive set which we have just described, 
a private stage was necessary. For this young sovereign, 
inimical to pomp and etiquette, athirst for simplicity and solitude, 
a palace in harmony with her tastes was needed. 

Versailles was large ; Marly too cold ; Fontainebleau and Com- 
pitgne too far. This new abode, where the queen was to be at 
home and herself, was to be Trianon. 

** His Majesty grows gallant," the Abb^ Baudeau wrote, on 
May 31, 1774: ** he said to the queen, * You love flowers. Very 
well, I have a bouquet to present to you ; it is Little Trianon.' " 
It is in these words that a chronicler of the time announces the 
gift of Louis XVL to Marie Antoinette. But we know to-day 
that the thing did not happen thus, and that it was the queen, 
who, desirous since a long while of having a country house for 
herself, asked her husband for Little Trianon. But the king 
yielded with the best grace in the world to his wife's request. 
At her first word, he replied with true civility that this country 
house belonged to the queen, and that he was charmed to make 
her a present of it. 



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LITTLE TRIANON. 171 



Littie Trianon, begun in 1753, and finished in 1766 by the 
architect Gabriel, had been for Louis XV. what it Wcis to be for 
Marie Antoinette, — a retreat where the sovereign went to forget 
the pomp of Versailles and the intrigues of the court. It was a 
little square pavilion of the Corinthian order, built in the Italian 
style, with a single principal story, a basement, and a very low 
second story, five windows on each side, which were separated 
on the front by beautiful columns with acanthus capitals, and by 
four pilasters of the same order on the other fagades. A simple 
but elegant edifice, situated in the midst of a park, which was to 
serve both as a school of gardening and as a botanical garden, 
and united as in an open-air museum the various kinds of gar- 
dens then known, — French, Italian, and English. An emeritus 
horticulturist, Claude Richard, had gathered there, on the order 
of the king, the most beautiful species of exotic trees, constructed 
greenhouses, and laid out parterres ; and the old monarch, who 
loved the physical sciences, had often gone there to botanize with 
his captain of the guards, the Due d'Ayen, or to talk plants with 
him whom Linnaeus called the cleverest gardener of Europe. 
From 1771 to 1774 his journeys to Trianon had been frequent; 
and it was there, on April 26, 1774, that the king had experienced 
the first symptoms of the disease which was to carry him off. 

Marie Antoinette had not, like her grandfather, a taste for 
natural history; but she had, like him, and even to a greater 
degree, a taste for retirement and a passion for the beautiful. 
Hardly had she taken possession of her new domain, by a dinner 
given to her husband on June 6, before she began to think of 
transforming it and fashioning it to her taste. The botanical 
garden interested her but little. The French garden did not 
please her : its long straight vistas, its avenues laid out by line, 
its trimmed trees, reminded her always of Versailles and of 
etiquette. The English garden, with its imitation of nature, 
its trees growing without constraint, its harmonious curves, its 
meadows, its charm of the unexpected, pleased her better; it 
seemed to her the symbol of liberty, which she had come to 
Trianon in search of. It was, moreover, the fashion of the 
moment: Horace Walpole in England, the Prince de Ligne in 
Belgium, in France certain rich financiers, or great personages, — 
Boutin at Tivoli, Laborde at M^rdville, the Due d'Orldans at Mon- 
ceau. Monsieur de Girardin at Ermenonville, — had made Eng- 
lish parks of universal reputation; the queen wished to have hers 

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1/2 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

at Trianon. The botanical garden was sacrificed ; the plants and 
herbs were transported to the Jardin du Roi ; and the space re- 
mained free for the new creation of the young sovereign. Her 
Lenotre was a noble, a distinguished amateur and clever de- 
signer, the Marquis de Caraman. The queen went on July 23, 
1774, to visit the garden of the Hotel Caraman in the Rue St. 
Dominique; she remained there an hour and a half, found it 
charming, herself charmed every one, and begged, the happy 
proprietor for his counsel for Trianon. Under his direction the 
architect Mique made the plan; Antoine Richard, son and suc- 
cessor of Claude, carried it out. With rare talent he made use 
of the riches already there, and while forming new groupings, 
succeeded in preserving the most beautiful specimens of the 
foreign trees. 

But the queen was not content with the plantations of Louis 
XV. ; each day she had new ones made. She increased her collec- 
tions; she made requisitions from all known countries ; explorers 
from over the sea were commissioned to bring her plants ; eight 
hundred species were gathered together in the park. ** The glory 
of Little Trianon," Arthur Young wrote, " are the exotic shrubs 
and trees. The whole world has been put under contribution to 
ornament it.'* Italy sent its evergreens; Louisiana its taxodi- 
ums; Arabia its aromatic firs; Virginia its robinias; China its 
rose acacias; the New World innumerable varieties of oak and nut 
trees. The Abb6s Nolet, Williams, and Moreau de la Rochette 
describe two hundred and thirty-nine kinds of trees and shrubs 
which North America alone furnished to Little Trianon. Ever- 
greens abounded ; the queen desired verdure even in winter. 
Pines from Corsica, green oaks from Provence, cypresses from 
Crete, arbutus from the Pyrenees, mingled their sombre foliage 
with the warmer tones of the red beeches and the lighter masses 
of the sophoras and tulips. Jussieu made out the list; Bonnefoy 
du Plan supervised the plantation. The queen watched them grow 
and blossom ; she had the cedar of Lebanon, which Jussieu had 
planted, watered before her eyes; and at Trianon the robinia 
opened its perfumed clusters for the first time in France before 
her. Everywhere and always there were flowers ; in the spring 
the lilacs, the favourites of the Comte d'Artois, who cultivated 
them at Bagatelle, syringas, snowballs, tuberoses. The parterres 
were filled with the most marvellous varieties of the iris, with 
tulips and hyacinths from Holland. Then there were the orange- 



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LITTLE TRIANON. 1 73 



trees, which perfumed the air with their penetrating odour, and of 
which the gardeners watched the blossoms during the night with 
jealous care ; the queen sold the harvest of them, — thirty pounds 
in bad years, sixty in good ones, and seventy-eight in 1780. 
From the first the park had been enlarged ; the meadow in which 
Louis XV. had amused himself by making experiments in culti- 
vating the land with a plough — which was for a long time pre- 
served — had been added to it. There the inequalities of ground 
were imitated : ravines were dug, hills were raised, great masses 
of rock were deposited ; a river was planned, whose waters, 
springing from a perpendicular rock surmounted by a ruin, trav- 
ersed the lawn in front of the chateau, sometimes visible, and 
sometimes hidden behind clumps of foliage, only to reappear a 
little farther on. It was a real river, this, although two thousand 
fathoms of pipe brought it from Marly, — not a solemn and regular 
sheet of water, as at Versailles, but a river with its natural course, 
its graceful meanderings, its bed of pebbles, its harmonious cas- 
cades, its murmuring flow, crossed by real bridges of stone from 
Vcrgetky, or of rustic wood, like those in Switzerland, flowing be- 
tween two banks of turf, whose flowered stretches, a traveller has 
said, ** seemed only to await the apparition of a shepherd." 

In the midst of these gardens rose charming edifices, springing 
from the ground as if under the wand of a fairy, — imitations of 
ruins, rustic houses, Chinese pavilions, a collection in that little 
corner of the world of the specimens of art and architecture of 
all times and countries. 

From whatever side of the chAteau one looked, the aspect was 
different. To the right of the facade was the English park, with 
its clumps of trees, its sheets of water, its lawns, reaching to a 
rocky and wild cliff", planted with yews, with thuyas, and with 
firs. Before the facade itself, toward the west, spreading out be- 
neath XhQ perrofiy and separated from Great Trianon by a double* 
grille, was the French garden in the style of Len6tre, with its 
parterres laid out at right angles, its avenues of orange-trees, its 
bowers, its statues placed in niches of foliage, its vases filled with 
rare flowers, and at the end the pavilion which served as a dining- 
room for Louis XV. And then on the other side, the theatre, 
built in 1778, with its portico formed of two Ionic columns; its 
pediment strewn with instruments of music, in the midst of which 
reclined an infant Apollo, holding a lyre in his left hand, a crown 
in his right; its decorations in white and gold; its chairs in blue 



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1/4 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

velvet; its three tiers of galleries resting upon consoles repre- 
senting the head and skin of a lion, a device of Louis XVI. ; its 
branches of oak and garlands of flowers held by Cupids ; its ceil- 
ing, whereon Lagren^e had painted Apollo, the Graces, and 
Thalia and Melpomene ; its nymphs, with cornucopias, on either 
side of the stage where the curtain was raised; its groups of 
women bearing torches ; its Muses, who with their softly rounded 
arms framed the monogram of the queen. 

On the third side of the chateau, behind, there was still the 
English garden, where the river wound in a thousand turns among 
the poplars and maples. From the bosom of the water rose, 
light and graceful as a naiad, an island of elegant outline, and 
upon the island the most enchanting marvel perhaps of that en- 
chanting Eden, a round temple of perfect proportion, whose 
Corinthian colonnade, delicately carved, sheltered beneath a rosette 
of acanthus leaves a statue of love by Bouchardon ; the god, in 
all the beauty and force of youth, was carving a bow from the 
club of Hercules. And farther on, the lake with its gently graded 
shores, its tranquil ripples, on which glided the gilt gondolas, 
with their fleur de lis^ and their pavilion in the colours of the 
queen, blue and white striped, that came from the Port of Depart- 
ure bound for the Port of Return. 

Each year brought an addition to this fairy creation. In 1776, 
at a short distance from the palace, the Chinese pavilion was 
built, and beneath the pavilion a roundabout, which was moved 
by invisible mechanism hidden beneath the ground, and whose 
riders sat astride of dragons and peacocks, carved by Bocciardi. 
In 1778 the Belvedere rose on the hill, among thickets of roses, 
myrtle, and jasmine. Mique had made the plan for it; the queen 
went there every morning to take her breakfast, served on a table* 
of gray marble, that rested on three feet of gilt bronze. From 
thence, through four openings turned toward the four cardinal 
points, she could view her whole domain and the river, which, 
springing from a mass of wild rock near by, flowed lazily 
about the base of the pavilion, as if leaving with regret so en- 
chanting a site. Eight sphinxes with female heads guarded the 
entrance; above the windows four groups, from the chisel of 
Deschamps, symbolized the four seasons; above the doors the 
attributes of the hunt and of gardening, carved by the same hand. 
In the interior, the floor was in white, blue, and rose marble ; and 
upon the stucco walls ran light arabesques, a graceful mixture of 



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LITTLE TRIANON. 17S 



smoking tripods, quivers, vases, and bouquets of flowers. Here a 
goldfinch drank from an onyx goblet ; there two doves chased 
each other ; beyond, a squirrel was eating a nut, or a canary was 
escaping from a golden cage. 

Not far from the Belvedere, and half hidden in a narrow ravine 
shaded by thick masses of trees, was a grotto which was only 
reached after a thousand turnings by a sombre stair cut in the rock. 
The rivulet which traversed it exhaled a dielicious freshness ; the 
light penetrated but dimly through a crack in the roof; a bushy 
growth concealed it from indiscreet eyes ; the moss which car- 
peted the walls and ceiling prevented the noises of the outer world 
from entering. It was a place for retirement and rest until the 
day when the queen was to hear the first murmurs of October 5. 

And now follow the river, pass the Temple of Love, push on 
to the lake. You will soon see the favourite creation of the queen, 
that which best represents her individuality, that which sprang 
altogether from her imagination and from her heart, — a work in 
the execution of which she had two allies, her architect, Mique, 
and her painter, Hubert Robert. There is no longer solitude as 
in the grotto : here is life, or at least the appearance of life, and 
of practical and laborious life. Here is a hamlet, with eight 
cottages, each one of which arranged cis if to house a family of 
peasants, surrounded by a little garden planted with vegetables 
and fruit-trees. The roofs are thatched, the windows furnished 
with little leaded panes of glass ; the galleries are of carved wood, 
over which honeysuckle and five-leaved ivy climb. There are 
barns to hold the harvest, wooden staircases to ascend to the 
granaries, wooden benches to sit upon. The queen's house, 
which communicates by a gallery with the billiard-house, is 
naturally the most beautiful of them all. She had vases of 
faience from St. Clement, filled with flowers, and grape arbours. 
Not far off" rose the tower of Marlborough, which received its 
name from an old song hummed by Madame Poitrine, the dau- 
phin's nurse, whose spiral staircase, decorated with geraniums 
and gilHflowers, was reflected in the lake. 

The hamlet was complete ; nothing was lacking that constitutes 
a real hamlet, — neither the farm, nor the grange, nor the poultry- 
yard, nor the gardener's house, nor that of the guard, nor the 
mill with its turning wheel. The queen and Hubert Robert 
thought of everything. Those historians of Marie Antoinette 
who have the best described in their playful style this charming 



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176 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

creation, wrote : " The queen and Hubert Robert have thought 
of everything, even to painting the fissures in the rocks, the 
cracks in the plaster, the bulging of the beams and bricks in the 
walls, as though time would not ruin rapidly enough the play- 
things of a queen." 

There was a veritable farmhouse thatched with straw, and living 
animals, beautiful Swiss cows, lambs, sheep that baaed, pigeons 
that cooed, and hens that cackled. There was a farmer named 
Valy, a guard named Vercy, a little boy who drove the cows, a 
maid-servant who carried the milk. The dairy was built on the 
edge of the lake, which served as refrigerator ; and if the water 
from the lake was not suitable, they drew other water from seven 
fountains, surmounted by figures of children holding swans with 
outspread wings. The slabs were of white marble ; the milk was 
set on them in vessels of porcelain made at the queen's factory 
in moulds afterwards broken. In the hamlet, if we may believe a 
traveller, though his testimony seems untrustworthy, "the king 
was miller, the queen was farmer, and Monsieur was school- 
master." It was village life, as one understood it in the eighteenth 
century, such as Florian had made fashionable ; a poem of Homer, 
an eclogue of Virgil, annotated by a story of Berquin, wherein 
Nausicas, perfumed and powdered, washed linen bordered with 
lace, with ebony beetles ; where Tietryes with red heels, crowned 
with garlands of roses, tended the sheep with crooks of gold. 
"It is a sheep-fold," the Chevalier de Boufflers said, "where 
nothing is lacking but the wolf." 

The hamlet was begun in 1782, and finished in 1788. Despite 
changes of plans and obstacles, it was built quickly; for the queen 
was eager in her desires. " You know your mistress," Fontainieu, 
the guardian of the stock, wrote to the architect Mique ; " she 
loves to enjoy things immediately." Then after its completion 
came a new transformation, for, to use Boufflers's expression, " the 
wolf entered the sheep-fold," and Marie Antoinette replied to the 
calumny which had already begun to assail her, with charity: " In 
this opera-bouffe village she installed twelve poor families, whom 
she supported out of her savings." 

All these creations of Trianon are delicious. Nothing can give 
any idea of their charm, which has survived after a hundred years, 
and gained a shade of melancholy which is but an attraction the 
more. The reputation of these gardens became at once universal ; 
poets sang of them ; lovers of the beautiful admired them. But 



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LITTLE TRIANON. 1 77 



from the first the malice of the chroniclers attacked the graceful 
fancy of the sovereign, and accused her of having changed the 
name of her domain to a German name. The queen was indig- 
nant; and to those who had the simplicity or impudence to ask 
permission to visit Little Vienna, she replied by a refusal that was 
a lesson. To all others Trianon was open. They thronged there 
from all parts, — from Paris, from Versailles, from the country, and 
from abroad. No traveller passed through France without wish- 
ing to visit these gardens of Armide ; there was not one who did 
not leave them enraptured. Arthur Young, who cannot be sus- 
pected of partiality for the works of the ancient monarchy, and 
who examined everything with English phlegm and the practical 
sense of an agriculturist, was in ecstasy over the luxuriant vegeta- 
tion and marvellous collections. He criticised the park as being 
somewhat crowded ; but he acknowledged that much of it was 
very pretty and well done, and that the Temple of Love was 
"truly elegant." 

More sensible, as they said in those days, Karamsine, the Rus- 
sian, declared that the gardei of Trianon was the most beautiful 
of all English gardens. 

*' I advance," he said, " and I see hills, fields, meadows, herds, a grotto. 
Fatigued by the splendours of art, I turn to nature ; I find myself, my heart, 
my imagination; I breathe, inhaling the perfumed air of the evening, 
gazing at the setting sun. ... I would like to stop it in its course, in order 
to remain longer at Trianon." 

The Baroness von Oberkirche, who accompanied the Comtesse 
du Nord to France, is not less enthusiastic : — 

" I went early in the morning to visit the queen's Little Trianon. What 
a charming promenade ! How delicious were the glades, perfumed with 
lilacs and peopled with nightingales ! The weather was magnificent ; the 
air was full of fragrant mist ; butterflies spread their golden wings beneath 
the rays of the spring sun. I have never passed more delightful moments 
than the three hours spent in visiting that retreat." 

After these opinions, — that of the somewhat sceptical English- 
man, of the sentimental Russian, and of the Alsatian, — do you 
wish to hear the judgment of a connoisseur, of a master in the 
delicate art of the decoration of gardens? Here is what the Prince 
de Ligne, the creator of Belceil, and one of the frequenters of 
Trianon, wrote in 1781 : — 

VOL. I. — 12 C"r^r^n]o 

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i;8 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

" I know nothing more beautiful or better executed than the temple and 
the pavilion. The colonnade of the one and the interior of the other are 
the height of perfection, in taste and in sculpture. The rocks and the 
waterfalls will produce a superb effect in a short time, for I think that the 
trees will hasten to grow in order to enhance the contrast of the buildings, 
the water, and the turf. The river is charming in a little stretch of straight 
line toward the temple ; the rest of its course is hidden or seen, as de- 
sirable. The clumps of trees are well distributed, and separate the objects 
which would otherwise be too near. There is a perfect grotto, well situated, 
and exceedingly natural. The hills are not sugar loaves, or ridiculous am- 
phitheatres. There is not one that does not look as if it had been there from 
the time of Pharaoh. The beds of flowers are agreeably placed. There 
was one which I thought looked a little too much like a ribbon ; it should, 
I think, be changed. It was the only defect I noticed, which proves that 
although Little Trianon may be made for enthusiasts, it is not enthusi- 
asm which excites me. There is nothing finicky, sought after ; nothing 
bizarre. All the forms are agreeable. Everything is in perfect and correct 
taste. Apparently the Graces have much sense, and add this advantage to 
those others which make them admired." 

In the palace there was the same elegance, and to use the Prince 
de Ligne's term, the same correctness. One ascended by an ample 
perron, with a double flight of steps, to the terraces, ornamented 
with balustrades. On passing the door, one entered a vestibule 
where garlands of oak ran along the walls. A head of Medusa 
seemed to forbid the approach of those who were disagreeable. 
For others, for the privileged ones, a vast staircase with stone 
steps and a gilt hand-rail, whereon branches of laurel were inter- 
twined with the monogram of the goddess of the place, invited 
entrance. In the centre hung a marvellous lantern, made of 
bundles of arrows and attributes of country life, lighted by twelve 
lights borne by little satyrs, seated. 

From the antechamber which opened from the head of the 
staircase one passed into the dining-room, whose wainscoting, ad- 
mirably sunk, off*ered on all sides a succession of fine arabesques, 
quivers, arrows, garlands of flowers, branches of laurel, sphinxes, 
baskets of fruits; the goats of Pan, with beards of ivy leaves, up- 
held the mantel of blue marble. In the middle of the room was 
the table made by Loriot for Louis XV., which rose, already 
served, through a trap-door in the floor, with its four servants^ 
discreet auxiliaries, that took the place of and did away with 
the eager attention and the importunate gaze of valets. 

Beyond the dining-room came the small salon, decorated every- 



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LITTLE TRIANON. 179 

where with bunches of grapes, with masks of comedy, with guitars 
and tambourines. In the large salon smiling and chubby Cupids 
played together at the angles of the cornice, while on the walls 
branches of lilies blossomed within wreaths of laurel. The furni- 
ture was of scarlet silk with gold galon. From the rosette, so 
delicate and so light that its clusters of flowers and fruits seemed 
scarcely fixed to the ceiling, was suspended a crystal chandelier, 
shining with a thousand lights. In the dressing-room two movable 
mirrors, rising from the floor at will, shut off" and masked the win- 
dows. Above was a small library, built in the entresol in 1780; 
on one side, the bath-room, where the water poured into a tub of 
white marble. 

A little boudoir, deliciously sculptured, with smoking tripods, 
cornucopias, doves lighting in nests of roses, shields covered with 
flejir de lis, monograms (M. A. pierced by harmless arrows and 
framed with daisies), led to the bedchamber of the queen, whose 
furniture in blue silk — that colour so becoming to blondes — was 
comfortably stuff*ed with eider-down, whose bed was hidden be- 
neath lace, whose curtains were held back with satin bands fringed 
with pearls and silver. A garland of forget-me-nots and poppies 
encircled the ceiling, and on the mantel a clock bearing the Aus- 
trian eagles and the crook and hat of a shepherd marked the 
happy hours of the sovereign of this place. Along the walls were 
some canvases of Pater and of Watteau, and two charming pictures 
presented by Maria Theresa, wherein Wertmiiller had represented 
two scenes which recalled her daughter's childhood, — the opera 
and the ballet executed by the archdukes and archduchesses at 
the marriage of Joseph II. In one, the sisters of the queen were 
giving a scene from an opera ; in the other, she who was then called 
Madame Antoine, dressed in a red bodice and a skirt of white 
satin, flowered with rose branches, was dancing a minuet with her 
brothers, Ferdinand and Maximilian. A contemporary asserts 
that there were also at Trianon, in the bedchamber of the queen, 
several portraits of the imperial family, in which, I know not 
from what lugubrious fancy, the august personages had had them- 
selves represented as monks digging their graves. Was this in 
order to introduce a serious thought in the midst of so many 
smiling fancies, and the image of death amid those emblems of 
pleasure? Was it the moral of the poem ? 

Everywhere else in the palace life abounded ; everywhere ap- 
peared thojse graceful attributes that symbolized the character of 



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l8o LIFE OF MAklE ANTOINETTE. 

the queen during her days of happiness, — simplicity and chann. 
It was there that the style which has been called Louis XVI. blos- 
somed in all its perfection, but which we would rather call the 
style of Marie Antoinette, for it was she who was the inspiration 
of it, — an exquisite style, which has remained during a century 
the standard of elegance and grace. It was there that the influ- 
ence of the queen on the taste and art of her time was evident. 
It was no longer the severe grandeur of Louis XIV. nor the affected 
decoration of Louis XV. ; it was a mean between these two, uniting 
the purity of line of the one with the delicacy of decoration of the 
other; solid, with an appearance of fragility, both graceful and 
dignified, harmonious without being affected, rounded without 
being contorted, comfortable without being voluptuous. Mytho- 
logical emblems, attributes of art and nature, sylvan scenes, 
Renaissance arabesques, emblems and symbols, flowers, fruit, 
and foliage, — all united in an ornamentation which shines above 
all by the abundance and delicacy of its details. The defamers 
of Marie Antoinette have accused her of remaining German; 
she was never more French than at Trianon. 

At her call all imaginations were set to work, all the arts met 
to conceive master-pieces. Deschamps sculptured the pediments 
of the Belvedere and the capitals of the Temple. Feret and 
Lagren^e painted the ceiling and walls of the theatre and of 
the palace ; Dutemps and Leriche gilded them. For the queen, 
Gouttitre — the celebrated Goutti^re, as he was called even during 
his lifetime — chiselled marvellous bronzes, Houdon cut marble, 
Clodion made his statuettes. Under her patronage, Leboeuf 
founded a porcelain factory in the Rue de Bondy. David Roet- 
gers designed furniture of such perfection that Louis XVI., the 
economical Louis XVI., was tempted to buy a marqiietrie writ- 
ing-desk for eighty thousand francs. Rosewood and violet-ebony 
were used with panels and plaques of Sevres ; the consoles and 
tables were heaped with a mass of rare and elegant objects, — 
groups in pdte tendre or dure, jars from China of blue porcelain, 
vases from Vienna in petrified wood, caskets of brown sardonyx 
or red jasper, boxes of Japanese lacquer or of vernis Martin, 
All was gay; all was exquisite. 

It was not only at Trianon that the fancies of the young sov- 
ereign had free play, but also at Fontainebleau. Nothing is 
more graceful than the suite of rooms which constituted the 
apartments of the queen in the old palace of the Valois. Mercy, 



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HER APARTMENTS AT FONTAINEBLEAU. l8l 

who saw them in their freshness, declared that artists of all kinds 
had exhausted all that magnificence, research, and taste could 
produce of the most curious and most agreeable. All vied with 
one another in decorating them; for the bedchamber, Lyons 
sent a most wonderful silk covered with rustic attributes, — rustic 
pipes, red partridges running in the fields, goldfinches singing on 
branches of flowers, baskets of fruit, and ruins of temples. The 
architect Rousseau directed the works ; Goutti^re placed on the 
chest of drawers charming decorations of bronze, clusters of 
grapes, heads of lions, scrolls of all sorts. Sevres added its 
transparent medallions. On the bed two gilded genii supported 
a crown above the intertwined monogram of Marie Antoinette. 

In the salon, a pupil of Boucher, Barth^lemy, painted music 
and the arts. In the bath-room he painted charming decorations 
on the mirrors. Gay Cupids, fresh and rosy, teased one another, 
chased one another, tumbling about, running after butterflies, 
catching birds, playing with flowers, and climbing up the rose- 
bushes. 

But the marvel at Fontainebleau was the boudoir ; and Madame 
de Stael was right when she wrote to Gustavus III. that the queen's 
boudoir in all its details was beautiful beyond all that could be 
imagined. There again the decorator was Barthdlemy. On 
the ceiling he painted Flora surrounded by Cupids, distributing 
a profusion of the perfumed products of her rich parterres. On 
the walls he lavished the most charming creations of his brush ; 
it was a mixture of Cupids, animals, and flowers, of branches of 
ivy, and of heads of lions, of crouching sphinxes and wreaths 
of bluets, marguerites, violets, and laurel. Over the doors, Cupid 
held a mirror for his mother, and groups of young girls danced 
before a satyr, or held by his wings a love who was seeking to 
escape. The mantel, in white marble, was held by sheaves of 
arrows forming columns ; and on the lintel was a wreath chiselled 
by Gouttiire, made up of garlands of foliage and flowers. If we 
may believe tradition, Louis XVI. himself forged the fastenings 
for the windows, on the mountings of which branches of ivy 
climbed; Vulcan this time worked for Venus. The floor was 
entirely of spotted mahogany, a very rare wood then, which 
to-day produces a sinister impression ; the red spots look like 
blood-stains. 

But let us return to Trianon. 

The kingdom of Marie Antoinette was small ; about sixty 



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I82 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

acres composed the garden. The house was still smaller; it 
was hardly twelve fathoms long. In the interior, besides the 
apartments of the mistress of the place, which we have just de- 
scribed, there only remained on the second floor a few low and 
small rooms, which were almost servants' rooms. It was indeed 
the house of a philosopher, which could contain only a limited 
number of friends, and that was just what the queen desired. 
She had created Trianon to escape from Versailles and Marly; 
she wished to be alone there with a few guests of her choice. 
She was no longer the sovereign of a vast empire, but the pro- 
prietress of a small domain ; it was the charm of private life after 
the fret of public life. There she was absolute mistress, and also 
chief justice; but her justice was tempered with mercy. " As for 
the man whom you hold in prison for the depredation committed, 
I beg you will release him," she wrote one day ; " and since the 
king tells me that h€ is my prisoner, I will pardon him." 

The simplicity she had dreamed of, the life of the affections, to 
which she had aspired since her childhood, the country existence, 
whose emblems were spread everywhere about her, — this was what 
she sought to realize at Trianon. It was there that she could say 
with Henry IV., " I am no longer queen; I am myself." In the 
morning she left Versailles, accompanied only by a footman ; she 
visited her garden and her flowers; she gathered bouquets of 
roses and of ivy ; and when in the evening she remained to sleep in 
her little ch&teau, the wife of the concierge served her as waiting- 
woman. On Sunday she allowed every one who was decently 
dressed to enter the park, principally nurse-maids and children. 
She organized balls there, rustic balls, sometimes under a tent, 
as in a village, sometimes in the barn of the hamlet; the queen 
herself took part, dancing a contre-danse^ to put every one at 
ease. Then she called the nurse-maids, had all the children pre- 
sented to her, inquired about their families, and overwhelmed them 
with bonbons and caresses. She loved children so dearly, and 
wished so much to have one herself, that at the end of 1776 she 
adopted a little peasant, whose happy face and good-humour had 
struck her. She gave other entertainments there ; and one day 
the park was transformed into a sort of fair-ground, where the 
ladies of the court were the merchants, and where the queen was 
lemonade-girl, with theatres, shows, and booths bordering the 
avenues. She organized journeys to Trianon, not such journeys 
as those to Marly, which were so expensive and so pompous, but 



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HEX LIFE AT TRIANON. 183 

journeys when she installed herself with a few of her intimate 
friends only; for, as we have said, the house was small, and did 
not admit of a large number. Madame Elisabeth was always 
there, then Madame de Polignac and her set, more rarely 
Madame de Lamballe. The king came on foot without his cap- 
tain of the guards, but never slept there. Monsieur appeared 
sometimes, the Comte d'Artois often. The guests arrived at two 
o'clock for dinner, and returned to Versailles before midnight. 

At Trianon there was no ceremony, no etiquette, no household, 
only friends. When the queen entered the salon, the ladies did 
not quit their work, nor the men interrupt their game of billiards 
or of trictrac. It was the life of the chateau, with all its agreeable 
liberty, such as Marie Antoinette had always dreamed, such as 
was practised in that patriarchal family of the Hapsburgs, which 
was, as Goethe has said, ** Only the first boiirgeoise family of the 
empire." They all met together for breakfast, which took the 
place of dinner ; afterward they played cards, chatted, or walked, 
and assembled again for supper, which was served early. No 
fine dressing, no complicated head-dresses, whose exaggerated 
height had forced the architect to enlarge the dimensions of the 
doors, and provoked the reprimands of Maria Theresa. A dress 
of white percale; a gauze fichu, a straw hat, — such was the toilet 
at Trianon ; a fresh and charming toilet, which set off admirably 
the supple figure and brilliant complexion of the goddess of the 
place, but whose extreme simplicity enraged the manufacturers 
of silk at Lyons, deserted for the linens of Alsace. There were 
no more noisy amusements, no more ruinous faro that drained 
the purse of the queen, none of those little games, a taste for 
which had been cultivated at the house of the Duchesse de Duras, 
such as blind-man's-buff and hide-and-seek, which had aroused 
the ire of the chroniclers. At Versailles and at Marly there were 
court amusements ; at Trianon they enjoyed the pleasures of the 
country, — open-air balls, like those we have just spoken of, a 
dance on the grass, billiards, the roundabout, and rides over 
the turf. 

The queen took her r61e of farmer seriously; she had her 
cows. Brunette and Blanchette, and milked them herself in por- 
celain jars ; she had a beautiful white goat with four horns, and 
white lambs which had been brought from Freiburg; she had 
her pigeons and her hens, which she fed ; she had her parterres, 
which she watered. From the dairy one passed to the barn, from 



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l84 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOIICETTE. 

the barn to the mill ; one ate fresh eggs at the farm, and drank 
warm milk at the barn ; one fished in the river or floated upon 
the lake in a gondola, and when tired of such occupation returned 
to sit in the shade and breathe the perfume of flowers while one 
worked ; for no one was idle at Trianon. The women embroi- 
dered, worked tapestry, or plied their distaffs ; the men made nets, 
read, or walked and chatted, — a charming life, where time passed 
without one's perceiving it, and where the fatigues and intrigues 
of Versailles were forgotten ; a still more charming life after 
God had granted the most ardent desires of the queen, and the 
aureole of maternity shone upon her head. For then it was not 
only repose and friendship which she sought at Trianon, but the 
health of her children, who played joyously upon the lawns, 
teased their lambs, hunted nests, hoed their gardens, breathed the 
open air, developed in all liberty, and gained from that liberty 
and the open air a vigorous and healthy mien. After this 
epoch, Trianon became more the vogue than ever, and there was 
hardly a day when the queen did not go to it from Versailles, 
either in the morning or the afternoon. It was there that she 
went to complete her convalescence after the severe and dramatic 
confinement at the birth of Madame Royale ; it was there that 
she watched the dauphin in the arms of Madame Poitrine, — the 
dauphin, whose birth softened her grief at the death of Maria 
Theresa, and whose name the poets, with a delicate flattery that 
went to the heart of the mother, associated in their praises of the 
groves which shaded his first steps. 

Such were her private pleasures ; but besides these, there were 
official entertainments, such as fall to the lot of crowned heads. 
No sovereign, no great personage, came to France without the 
queen's desiring herself to do the honours of her domain. Whether 
it was Joseph II., the prince of Hesse-Darmstadt, the Comte du 
Nord, or the king of Sweden, there was always an entertainment 
in their honour at Trianon. It made in some sort a part of the 
ordinary programme of the amusements which were offered to 
foreigners of distinction. Then there were less noisy entertain- 
ments, such as she gave to the king, who appreciated them 
greatly; for he loved ceremony and pomp no better than his 
wife. Trianon for him, as for the queen, meant simplicity, and 
also economy in comparison with Fontainebleau and Marly. 
Sometimes a few nobles were invited, or a few ladies of the court 
like Madame la Mar^chale de Noailles, the Duchesse de Coss6, 



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HER PATRONAGE OF AUTHORS. l8S 

the Marquise de Sabran, often even ladies from Paris. The ave- 
nues were then illuminated with those coloured lanterns which 
gave so soft a light and so delicate a shadow that, as an eye- 
witness has said, " the water, the trees, and the people all seemed 
ethereal." 

After the illumination there was supper, spectacle, ballet, or 
walks in the garden, which were prolonged often quite late into 
the night. But what made these assemblies most attractive was 
the affability of the queen. She exerted her ingenuity to show 
her guests attention ; and each one departed enchanted with the 
place and its delights, and still more with the kindness and gra- 
ciousness of the proprietress. Mercy himself, who had looked 
with distrust on certain innovations introduced at these entertain- 
ments, acknowledged that they were charming by reason of the 
amiability of the queen. " Provided that they do not become 
too frequent or too expensive," he added, ** they can only aid in 
establishing good form at the cotirt, and a species of amusement 
which is fitting." 

Nor were there walks only at Trianon ; one talked and read. 
Although Madame Campan has asserted that Marie Antoinette 
did little for literature and the arts, it is certain that she had a 
taste for intellectual pleasures, and that it gave her pleasure to 
encourage authors. She extended her protection to La Harpe, 
and had him given a pension of twelve hundred livres ; she pat- 
ronized De Lille, and out of gratitude the poet sang of the gardens 
of Trianon ; she laughed at the funny verses of Cresset, and made 
a charming remark to the painter Vernet: ** Monsieur Vernet, it 
is always you who make the fair weather and the rain ; " she ob- 
tained a gift of twelve hundred livres for the great-nephew of 
Corneille, which admitted him to the Com^die Frangaise; she 
had printed at her own expense at the royal printing-house a 
magnificent edition of the favourite poet of her childhood, Metas- 
tasio, and sent a copy to the illustrious writer. She applauded 
the *' Ecole des Pires," and after the representation, commanded 
the Mar^chal de Duras to congratulate the author of the drama 
on the decent and moral tone noticeable in his work. She had 
Lemercier's " Meleager " played at the Com^die Fran^aise, was 
present at the first representation, and desired the young author 
to sit by her in her box, in order the better to enjoy a success of 
which she had no doubt, and which, in fact, did not disappoint 
her expectations. She granted a pension to Chamfort, and told 



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I86 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

him of it in such flattering words that the author of *' Mustapha 
and Z^angir," in his enthusiasm, swore a very fleeting oath that 
he should never forget it. 

But she could not pardon Voltaire for his attacks on the ancient 
faith of France ; and if she did not go so far as to regard him as an 
extravagant, as her mother did, she felt little sympathy for him. 
When, in the spring of 1788, that philosopher made a visit to 
Paris which was but one long triumph, she refused to receive 
him at Versailles. Indifferent to what the public might say, or 
the chroniclers affirm, and despite the solicitation of the friends 
of Voltaire, she declared that she would have nothing to do with a 
man whose morality had occasioned so many troubles and incon- 
veniences. This fact has been contested ; it is positive to-day. 

Her judgments, however, were not always so inflexible, nor 
her liking, like her literary repugnances, so well founded. If one 
day, on reading Florian's " Numa Pompilius," she let fall the 
piquant and true expression, " I seem to be eating milk-soup," 
at other times her opinion was not so correct, as happened in 
the case of that play of Dorat-Cubi^res, which, although found 
charming when Mole read it in the queen's boudoir, was pro- 
nounced so bad on its representation at Fontainebleau that the 
king for the first time ordered the curtain to be lowered before 
the end of the comedy ; or in the case of the " Conn^table de Bour- 
bon " by the Comte de Guibert, which, despite royal protection, 
failed so lamentably at the marriage of Madame Clotilde. But 
the queen made no pretensions, and was the first to laugh at 
her mistakes. 

Among so many amusements, wherein was evident a fancy 
often fickle, there was one taste which was constant, — her love 
of music. Marie Antoinette had manifested it from her youth. 
As a child she had played with Mozart, and had received lessons 
from Gluck. As dauphiness, on her arrival in France, she had 
studied the harpsichord every day, had given little concerts in her 
apartment, had sung with Madame Clotilde, and had amused 
herself with playing on the harp. As queen, in the midst of 
those diversions which her mother reproached her for, she con- 
tinued her music lessons and her concerts. The lessons often 
lasted two hours, and the concert of the evening served as a repe- 
tition of the morning's lesson. Her progress was real, and her 
pleasure so lively that Mercy feared it might be prejudicial to 
more serious occupations. Even at Fontainebleau, which was the 



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HER KINDNESS TO GLUCK. 187 

scene of her greatest dissipation, — the young woman herself 
avows it, — she had two professors of music, one for the harp and 
another for singing. At Paris she went from preference to the 
opera, and to the Com^die Italienne; and it was also to please her 
that the opera consented to bring the celebrated " Capelmeister," 
Gluck, from Vienna. 

Gluck was for Marie Antoinette more than a great composer, 
he was the embodiment of a memory, of a memory of her youth 
and of her country, and also of a hope of a reform in French art, 
which she found monotonous. From the start she encouraged 
him; she took him under her high protection; she had his 
** Iphigenia in Aulis" studied, and on the day when the piece 
was finally given, on April 19, 1774, she applauded it until it 
looked as if she wished to create a cabal. She had a pension 
of six thousand francs given to the illustrious author; she pro- 
tected him against his enemies ; she supported him by her ap- 
plause, despite the coldness of the spectators, at the first 
representation of ** Alcestis ; " and when a hostile coterie sent for 
Piccini, in order to oppose him to Gluck, and when the fickle 
public seemed to abandon the German composer for the Italian 
master, she took the part of the teacher of her youth. On his 
arrival, she granted him entrance to her toilet, and so long 
as he remained there, did not cease to talk to him ; she ques- 
tioned him kindly about his work, and the great musician, in 
whom the malice of critics had not shaken his own faith in his 
genius, replied to her with imperturbable self-possession, " Ma- 
dame, 'Armid' will soon be finished, and will be truly superb." 
Despite a first undecided reception, the public applause soon 
justified the confidence of Gluck and the protection of the queen. 
The Prince d'Henin, he who was called the dwarf of princes, per- 
mitted himself to interrupt Gluck cavalierly at the house of Sophie 
Arnould ; the Due de Nivernais took up the gauntlet in order to 
please his sovereign, and if the afTair was arranged, it was because 
the prince, to whom Marie Antoinette sent word that she knew 
whence came the insult and insinuated that he must repair it, 
consented to visit the composer, which visit was an apology. 
When the Due de Noailles, who was more talented and less lively 
than the Prince d'Henin, cried that the " Electra " of Lemoyne 
was not worth twopence, since the author was a pupil of Gluck, 
it was the queen herself who undertook the defence of teacher 
and pupil against the old courtier. 

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1 88 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

When at the end of five years, the great man, embittered and 
discouraged by the failure of '* Echo et Narcisse," prepared to 
leave Paris, his royal pupil made him promise to return, and con- 
ferred upon him as a parting gift the title of music-master to the 
Children of France. 

But the queen was not exclusive; she not only protected 
Gluck, but also received his rival, Piccini, whom she even par- 
doned for having received for a moment the support of Madame 
du Barry. She made use of the struggle between the two com- 
posers to give French music a new impetus; while preserving 
her preferences, she distributed her favours to both of them. 
Piccini had scarcely arrived in France before she received him ; 
she took singing lessons of him twice a week, and gave him, with 
the title of composer of her lyrical spectacle, a salary of four 
thousand livres, which he was still drawing at the beginning of 
the Revolution. She was anxious to hear the first two acts of 
** Roland,'' which she had him rehearse in her presence. The Prince 
de Ligne relates that, wishing to sing before her Italian master, 
whom she begged to accompany her, she inadvertently chose a 
piece from Gluck's "Alcestis." But, the prince added, "the 
grace with which she repaired these mistakes, which she often 
made, and a sort of ingenuousness which became her well, proved 
the goodness and the sensibility of a beautiful soul, and added a 
charm to her face, whose blushes accompanied her pretty regrets, 
excuses, and often also her good deeds." 

Besides Gluck and Piccini, there was Gr^try, whose light music 
pleased her infinitely. She consented to be godmother to the 
composer's daughter ; she gave her her name ; she had her come 
every month to Versailles, where she overwhelmed her with ca- 
resses and presents ; and when she went to the theatre, after the 
three reverences which etiquette required her to make to the 
public, her eyes sought her little goddaughter, and she threw a 
kiss to her, to the applause of the spectators. 

And later, when Gluck had definitely deserted Paris for Vienna, 
and even the most pressing royal appeals could not recall him, 
it was Sacchini whom the queen upheld energetically for a time 
against the secret opposition of the committee of the opera and 
the malevolence of the manager of the Menus-Plaisirs, Papilion 
de la Fert6, — Sacchini, whose '* Dardanus " was to be given for the 
first time on the stage at Trianon. 

There was also Lemoyne, whom she honoured with her favour 



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HER TASTE FOR THE STAGE. 1 89 

at the same time as Sacchini ; there was Sali^ri, a pupil of Gluck, 
whose " Danaides," attributed to the collaboration of the master, 
took the queen to the opera, eager to applaud a new master-piece 
of her old professor. Madame Campan no doubt exaggerates 
when she attributes to Marie Antoinette the degree of excellence 
to which French music then attained. But it is certain that she 
contributed much by her patronage to lift our lyrical stage from 
its old routine, and to infuse new spirit into it. Her taste was not 
always as infallibly correct as her friends claimed, but it is none 
the less true — a competent critic has recognized it — that 
among the works which she honoured with her protection, she 
seldom made a bad choice or judged incorrectly. 

After the composers came the artists. The queen showed 
great kindness to Saint-Huberty, who deserved it, if not by his 
character, at least by his talent. She had granted to Made- 
moiselle Trial fifteen hundred livres of annual pension. When 
Garat arrived from Bordeaux at the age of sixteen, and created a 
sensation in Paris, she wished immediately to hear him ; she sent 
for him in a carriage with six horses ; she obtained for him, from 
the king's purse, a pension of six thousand livres to pay his 
debts ; she even carried her condescension so far — she repented 
of it later — as to. sing with him. She also received Michu from 
the Com^die Fran^aise ; she admitted him to her intimacy, and 
manifested an extreme pleasure in I'stening to him ; she not only 
listened to him, but took lessons from him ; and it was owing to 
these lessons that she passed from music to a new amusement, 
whither we must follow her, and which leads us again to Trianon, — 
the stage. 

While Marie Antoinette was still quite young she had shown a 
lively taste for the stage. While she was still only dauphiness, 
she had, if you remember, organized with her brothers-in-law 
and sisters-in-law some little representations in her private apart- 
ment ; and only the fear of the old king had put an end to the 
amusement, which greatly diverted the young people. After she 
became queen, she renounced for a time her desire to appear 
upon the stage, but she preserved her love for the theatre. At 
Marly, a stage was improvised in a barn, and Montansier went 
there to play. At Trianon, after the theatre had been built in 
1778, there was no entertainment without a play. At Choisy, 
during their little visits, there was a play almost every day and 
sometimes twice a day. In the morning opera, and French or 



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I90 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

Italian comedy at the usual hour; in the evening, at eleven 
o'clock, parodies were given, where the chief actors of the opera 
appeared in the most bizarre rdles and costumes. A celebrated 
dancer, named Guimard, took the principal part. Her extreme 
thinness and little cracked voice added to the grotesqueness of 
the personages whom she imitated. But the queen had little taste 
for that sort of diversion, of which, on the other hand, Louis XVI. 
was very fond. Her delicate and refined nature was ill in accord 
with those parodies, which were often vulgar. " Is that all ? " she 
asked, yawning, after the representation on the stage at Versailles 
of a farce entitled, " Les Battus paient TAmende," which had been 
a great success at Paris. 

Private theatricals were then more the fashion than ever. At 
all great houses, in all the chateaux, there was a theatre and a 
company of amateurs organized like any real company, prac- 
tising like them, rehearsing like them, and taking lessons from 
actors of renown. From the court the contagion passed to the 
army, and an ordinance from the minister of war was necessary 
to put a stop^ an amusement to which the officers seemed about 
to sacrifice their profession. 

Certain great nobles had, besides their usual residences, a little 
house in the country, situated in the midst of gardens, and 
especially designed for dramatic representations. The Due 
d*0rl6ans, the grandson of the Regent, had a theatre of this sort 
at Bagnolet in the Faubourg du Roule ; and it was there that the 
greatest number of the comedies of Col\6 were given, in which 
the pious husband of Madame de Montesson did not disdain to 
accept a part. The Prince de Cond^ had the same at Chantilly, 
and Madame Elisabeth herself played ** Nanine " with her friends. 

What the princes of the blood did, and what the great king 
had authorized by his example, Marie Antoinette wished also to 
do. The war at that period kept all the officers away from Ver- 
sailles ; the summer had sent a great number of the courtiers 
to their chateaux; amusements became rare at court. The 
queen bethought herself of this new means to break the mo- 
notony of an existence which dragged painfully. Like the Due 
d'0rl6ans, she resolved to have and had her company. We have 
described the theatre above. The company was made up of the 
intimates of the Polignac set: first, the favourite; her daughter, 
the Duchesse de Guiche ; her cousin, Madame de ChAlons ; her 
sisters-in-law, the Comtesse Diane and the Comtesse de Polas- 



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HER THEATRE AT TRIANON. 191 

tron. Madame Campan recounts that it was agreed that, with 
the exception of the Comte d' Artois, no man should be admitted 
to the company. If this resolution was taken, it was not kept ; 
for from the first we find among the actors the Comte d'Adh^- 
mar, the Comte Esterhazy, and Monsieur de Polignac, who were 
soon joined by the Comte de Vaudreuil, the Duc^de Guiche, and 
the Bailiff of Crussol. The organizer of all the details was the 
secretary of the queen's commands, Monsieur Campan, to the 
great displeasure of the Due de Fronsac, who saw therein an 
attack on his prerogatives as first gentleman of the chamber; 
he made a written appeal and received the following response : 
'* You cannot be first gentleman when we are only actors. I have 
told you my wishes with regard to Trianon. I hold no court 
there ; I live there as a private person, and Monsieur Campan 
will always be charged with the orders relative to the entertain- 
ments which I wish to give there." The duke would not ac- 
knowledge himself beaten, and whenever he went to the toilet 
of the queen, did not fail to let fall some remark against his 
" colleague," Campan. The queen shrugged her shoulders, and 
when he was gone, said, " It is distressing to find so petty a man 
in the son of the Mar^chal de Richelieu." 

The professors were Dazincourt, Caillot, a celebrated actor 
who had long since retired from the theatre, and Michu from the 
Com6die Italienne, — the first for comedy, the two others for 
comic opera. 

When the august company thought themselves sufficiently per- 
fect, they made their d^but on Aug. i, 1780, and as a beginning 
attacked two of the pieces best known at that epoch, and where- 
in consequently comparison was the more dangerous with pro- 
fessional actors, — " Le Roi et le Fermier," by Sedaine and Mon- 
signy, and ** La Gageure Impr^vue " by Sedaine. " The queen," 
Grimm says in his correspondence, speaking of this first repre- 
sentation, — " the queen, to whom no grace is foreign, and who 
knows how to adopt them all without losing her own, played in 
the first piece the r61e of Jenny, and in the second that of the sou- 
brette." There were no spectators besides the king and the princes 
and princesses of the royal family without any following ; in the 
parterre, the subordinate servants, such as waiting-women, foot- 
men, and hussars, \^ho found themselves at Trianon by reason of 
their service, — in all, about forty people. Through the praises, 
somewhat emphatic, of Grimm, and despite the inexperience of 



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192 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

the artists, it is easy to see that the success of the first entertain- 
ment was satisfactory. The king was greatly amused ; the actors 
were enchanted. Ten days later they began again with a comic 
opera by Sedaine and Monsigny, ** On ne s'avise jamais de tout," 
and the comedy by Barthe, " Les Fausses Infidfelit^s," then on Sep- 
tember 6, appealed in " L' Anglais k Bordeaux " and " Le Sorcier." 
This time the queen desired to have her sister-in-law, Madame, join 
the company, in order to give it credit in the eyes of the public. 
Madame asked nothing better, more perhaps from policy than 
from taste, but Monsieur formally forbade it. On the other hand, 
the king did not disguise the pleasure which he took in these 
diversions ; he prolonged his evenings, and seemed in no hurry 
to retire at his ordinary hour, even assisting at the rehearsals, 
and when the queen performed her part, himself gave the signal 
for applause. The play lasted till nine o'clock, and was followed 
by a supper for the members of the royal family and the* actors 
and actresses. On leaving the table, the court separated, and 
there were no late hours. 

Encouraged by this approbation, they made another attempt 
on September 19. At the last moment the queen wished to put 
off the representation because of her daughter's indisposition. It 
was the king who declared that there was nothing alarming in 
the condition of the young princess, and that they must not 
change the amusement of the day. This time they chose two 
pieces that had created a sensation at the Com^die Italienne and 
at the opera : ** Rose et Colas " by Sedaine and Monsigny, and 
the ** Soothsayer of the Village," by Rousseau. In this last 
piece especially, they not only exposed themselves to compari- 
son with the first artists of the opera, but evoked the dangerous 
memory of Madame de Pompadour's excellent company. The 
comparison, however, does not seem to have been too unfavour- 
able. The Comte d'Adh^mar indeed provoked some ironical 
smiles by his tremulous voice and white hair, somewhat out of 
place in the r61e of the shepherd Colin ; and the queen had the 
right to say that it would be difficult even for malice to find any- 
thing to arraign in her choice of a lover. But the Comte de 
Vaudreuil, the best amateur actor of Paris, according to Grimm, 
played the part of the soothsayer very well ; and Mercy, who was 
present at the representation in a grated /og-e, on Marie Antoi- 
nette's formal request, and who disapproved in his heart of this 
species of amusement, — Mercy wrote to Maria Theresa, who 
was also alarmed at this new amusement, — r^ T 

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HER THEATRE AT TRIANON. 193 

" The queen has a very agreeable and correct voice ; her manner of 
playing is noble and full of grace. On the whole, the play was as well 
given as it could be by any company of amateurs. I observed that the 
king followed it with an attention and pleasure that was manifest in his 
whole mien ; during the mtr'actes^ he ascended the stage and went to the 
dressing-room of the queen." 

The public was less good-natured than the king, and more 
exacting than Mercy. Hurt at being excluded from these pri- 
vate representations, they criticised them with bitterness; and 
the journals, always ill-disposed, fell with avidity upon the 
thousand anecdotes invented by the malcontents. It was related 
that the king, who, they said, was only present from amiability, did 
not hesitate to hiss his august consort. They asserted that the 
queen, annoyed at not having more spectators, had the body- 
guards enter; and that at the end of the evening, she had ad- • 
vanced to the front of the stage, and had so far forgotten her 
dignity as to say, *' Gentlemen, I have done what I could to 
amuse you ; I would have wished to act better in order to give 
you more pleasure." These anecdotes were false; the docu- 
ments to-day allow us to affirm it ; none the less they circulated 
among the people, and were the more acceptable in proportion 
as they were malicious and hurtful to the reputation of the 
queen. 

The spectacle at Trianon was interrupted in 1781, owing to an 
indisposition of Marie Antoinette, or perhaps in consequence of 
Mercy's observation, but were begun again in 1782, with the " Sage 
^tourdi " by Boissy, and the " Veillde villageoise," by Piis and 
Barr6; in 1783 with the **Tonnelier" of Audinot, and the 
** Sabots " of Sedaine, then with " Isabelle and Gertrude " by 
Favart, and the ** Deux Chasseurs et la Laiti^re " of Anseaume 
and Duni. The queen concerned herself with every detail ; she 
superintended the least addition and had the scenes which seemed 
to her insufficient or worn out repainted. She was, in a word, 
the supreme director of her company, and showed herself jealous 
of her authority. " It seems to me," she wrote, " that my little 
company at Trianon should be exempt from the rules of ordinary 
service." The prudent severity with regard to the first represen- 
tations became relaxed. The audience, which had at first been 
strictly limited to the royal family, and in the parterre to some 
waiting-women, was enlarged little by little. The door which in 
1780 was closed even to the Princesse de Lamballe was finally 
VOL. I.— 13 ^ , 

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194 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

opened to some ladies of the court, then to the officers of the 
Life Guards, and the equerries of the king, and to his brothers. 
They had begun with forty spectators; they ended with two 
hundred. 

What was in reality the artistic value of this company at 
Trianon? In the midst of so many contradictory opinions, some 
of them severe from malice, others laudatory, perhaps from flat- 
tery, it is difficult to form a judgment. It seems, however, that 
the criticism of Mercy was the most impartial : the company at 
Trianon was neither better nor worse than ordinary amateur 
companies. The Comte d* Artois displayed agreeable talent ; the 
Comte de Vaudreuil proved himself a good actor. As for the 
queen, if one spectator, according to the testimony of Ba- 
chaumont, — but the anecdote appears untrustworthy, — said that 
her acting was royally bad, the Chevalier de Lille, a connoisseur, 
who saw her in the **VeiIlde villageoise," wrote that she played 
her part of Babet delightfully. It seems certain at all times 
that the august actors were more successful in comedy than in 
comic opera, nor had they any illusions on the subject of their 
lyrical capacities. 

Was it their confidence in their talents as comedians that led 
them to attempt in 1785 the famous comedy of Beaumarchais, 
"The Barber of Seville"? "The Barber of Seville" was the last 
effort of the company ; it was the closing of the theatre at Trianon, 
but that representation, which was an imprudence, belongs to 
darker days, and we are still in the period of happy days. 
We shall speak of it later, and for the present content ourselves 
with listening to the dull grumblings of the storm gathering in 
the distance. 

Malice, which had not ceased to follow Marie Antoinette from 
her entrance into France, and pursue every act and word, attacked 
Trianon with especial bitterness, because more than anything else 
Trianon was herself They affected to see in the embellishments 
which the queen bestowed upon her favourite residence one of the 
causes, even the principal cause, of the deficit in the treasury ; and 
this rumour, started at Versailles in a little circle of malcontents, 
propagated at Paris and in the country, repeated its echoes in the 
requisitions of Fouquier-Tinville, even in the questions of Dumas, 
who at the Revolutionary tribunal catechised the queen upon ** the 
millions sunk at Trianon." These millions reduced themselves 
to one and a half, or two at most, spread over fifteen years, from 



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THE EXPENSES OF TRIANON. 195 

1776 to 1790. It has been proved that the average expense 
necessitated by the creation or preservation of so many charming 
fancies scareiy exceeded one hundred or one hundred and thirty 
livres a year; the total amount for the buildings did not reach 
more than five hundred thousand livres; the decoration has been 
estimated at not more than two hundred and fifty thousand livres. 
The account of the sculptor, Deschamps, for example, who cov- 
ered the walls and pediments of those enchanting buildings 
with his arabesques, only amounted, from Oct. 6, 1777, to Sept. 
15, 1786, to one hundred and thirteen thousand six hundred 
and sixty-five livres, and was not settled until Aug. 31, 1791. 
Mercy himself, who in his reports to Maria Theresa exhibited 
some alarm at what this new domain might cost the queen, only 
estimates the expense of the English park at one hundred and 
fifty thousand livres. A memorandum of Monsieur d'Angivil- 
Hers, preserved in the archives, confirms that in 1777 the total 
amount for making the garden at Trianon, which he said the 
queen was in a great hurry to enjoy, only reached three hundred 
and fifty-two thousand two hundred and seventy-five livres, ten 
sous, and ten deniers. If one wishes to enter into details, the keep- 
ing up of the gardens, which under Louis XV. exceeded thirty 
thousand livres, was in 1775 but twelve thousand; in 1777 but 
fifteen thousand, and in the end only six thousand four hundred 
and seventy-six thousand livres, and twelve sous; the Chinese 
pavilion and roundabout cost forty-one thousand livres; the 
rock whence sprang the river nine thousand ; the Belvedere, that 
exquisite model, about sixty-five thousand. What is this in 
comparison with the expenditures of the financiers of the time, 
of Boutin at Tivoli, or of Laborde at M6r6vi\le? Even the 
theatre of the queen, which excited so much criticism, and with 
perhaps some justice, — that theatre with its small company, its 
limited orchestra, its choruses, its infrequent representations, — 
what was it compared to that of the Duchesse du Maine at 
Sceaux, and, above all, tathat of the Petifs Cabinets of Madame 
de Pompadour, which was kept up at the greatest expense, and 
which in six years had given not less than sixty works, many of 
which were repeated as many as five or six times? 

We must avow, however, that if malice has greatly exaggerated 
the so-called prodigalities of the queen in her gracious domain, 
Trianon was none the less not without its disadvantages. Even the 
most devoted friends of Marie Antoinette regretted, and she her- 



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196 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

self regretted later, her taste for the theatre, which led her to con- 
sort with comedians, to receive their counsels, to play their parts. 
It seemed hardly compatible with the majesty of a throne that 
the queen should travesty herself as a soubrette. With regard to 
the public it was even worse. The people easily pardon expen- 
ditures, even follies, which they enjoy, while they are always dis- 
posed to exaggerate those in which they have no share. Excluded 
from the entertainments at Trianon, they regarded them as ruin- 
ous prodigalities, and as insults to their misery. Hence arose 
those malevolent stories which incriminated all the acts of Marie 
Antoinette, her walks, her words, her affections, which imputed 
to her a levity and an imaginary insolence, and which found such 
easy access to prejudiced minds. A few bundles of dry branches 
were burned to illuminate the park for the visit of Joseph II.; 
public opinion was immediately aroused against this unheard-of 
excess, and the three thousand fagots were transformed in popular 
imagination to an entire forest. 

The court was not less incensed. Those who were not invited 
to Trianon were jealous of those who were admitted. The exclu- 
sive favour shown to a few persons hurt those who did not partake 
of it. The ladies of the palace whose service only necessitated 
their appearance on Sundays and state days at the toilet of the 
queen and at the services of the church, were loud in their com- 
plaints, not only against those who had entrance to Trianon, but 
against the princess who bestowed her favours so unequally. 
Jealousy turned their heads, and gave birth to a sort of " aliena- 
tion," as Mercy said. No one went to Trianon ; but neither did 
they go to Versailles. 

Court was hardly held ; the palace became a desert. Versailles, 
the theatre of the magnificence of Louis XIV,, whither persons 
had eagerly thronged from all parts of Europe to take lessons in 
politeness and good taste, became, a contemporary has said, 
only little country town, whither one went with reluctance, and 
whence one fled as quickly as possible. Ambition and cupidity 
were none the less active, but one sought rather to gain protectors 
among the personages in power, and favours were only obtained 
second-hand. Thus authority was weakened at the moment that 
disaffection began, and respect was lost. When the king, yielding 
to his love of simplicity and solitude, countenanced the amuse- 
ments of Trianon, and a form of society which was too limited for 
a nation as lively, eager, and fond of splendour as the French, he 



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ENVY OF THE COURTIERS. 197 

did not see that in affecting the habits and existence of a private 
man he said to his people, accustomed to pompous etiquette, and 
to the traditions of majesty, not only of Louis XIV., but even of 
Louis XV., that their successor had neither the tastes nor virtues 
of a monarch. When the queen, who seemed destined by nature 
to occupy the first throne of the world, escaped from her duties of 
receiving to open her heart to Madame de Polignac, and to shut 
herself up with her at Trianon, the courtiers, envious of a partiality 
which seemed to them exclusive, spied upon the least grace ac- 
corded to the favourite, attributed to her influence the actions of 
the queen, and to the queen's influence the resolutions of govern- 
ment, and held Marie Antoinette responsible for the elevation of 
the one and the discomfiture of the other, for the deficit in the 
treasury, for the increase in taxes, and heaped upon her head those 
tempests of unpopularity and those storms of rage whose first 
flashes disturbed Mercy, wrung tears from Maria Theresa on her 
death-bed, and brought upon the young and imprudent sovereign 
the severe and sometimes brutal remonstrances of her brother, 
Joseph II. 



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CHAPTER XV. 

Joseph II.'s Journey to France. — Character of the Emperor; 
HIS Plan of the Journey formed, abandoned, taken up again. 
— The Queen's Joy on seeing her Brother. — First Inter- 
views. — Reprimands often Maladroit. — The Emperor and 
THE Queen at the Opera. — Visits to the Monuments and 
Principal Institutions of the City of Paris. — Affectation of 
Simplicity. — Enthusiasm of the Public. — Departure of the 
Emperor; his Opinion of the Queen. — Advice which he left 
her in Writing. — The Queen conforms to it during a Time, 

THEN falls again INTO DISSIPATION. — WhY ? 

IT had been a long time since Joseph II. had formed the proj'ect 
of going to France. In the very year of the dauphiness's 
marriage, he had informed his ambassador, the Comte de Mercy, 
of his intention. 

This prince possessed an inquiring but ill-balanced mind, was 
obstinate rather than firm, had more vivacity than good sense, 
conceived vast plans, but did not mature them, had a passion for 
little things, and lost himself in details, — " governed too much," as 
the Prince de Ligne said, ** but did not reign enough," — used the 
language of a liberal with the conduct of an absolute monarch, 
and spoiled really good qualities by his unfortunate defects. 
With the desire to learn, he had not the patience to study. 
" His questions," Gleichen said, " seemed to seek counsel, but 
usually only sought to find advice that accorded with his own 
views." On the death of his father in 1765, he became emperor, 
and distressed his mother by his restless interference, his unquiet 
precipitation, his mania for change, his philosophical Utopias, his 
feverish ambition, which neither the vigour of his talents, the 
clearness of his views, nor his force of character warranted. He 
sincerely desired the happiness of his people, but desired it as a 
theorist rather than as a practical man, and only succeeded in 
elevating them by vexatious reforms, which were repugnant to 
their traditions, to their customs, and to their beliefs. Fourteen 



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JOSEPH II.'S JOURNEY TO FRANCE. 199 

years older than Marie Antoinette, he assumed toward her the 
attitude of a father, spoke to her with the authority of experience, 
but he too often counteracted the wisdom of his advice by his 
dryness of tone and brusqueness of manner. He forgot too 
readily that the child he had lectured at Vienna was grown up, 
that the dauphiness was become queen. The young princess, 
though usually docile and deferential toward the brother whom 
she loved dearly, sometimes rebelled against his dominating airs, 
and the sarcastic lessons of a mentor who insisted upon writing to 
her in German and treating her as a little girl. These were, how- 
ever, only passing clouds. Their correspondence soon resumed 
its affectionate tone ; and it was in great part the desire to see 
Marie Antoinette that determined the emperor to visit France, — 
a country which he did not love, and against which he, together 
with all the principal nobles of his court, nourished invincible 
prejudices. To see the queen, to study her character and conduct, 
to make the personal acquaintance of the king, to judge of the 
situation of the court for the present and the future, to observe 
all that a great monarchy can offer of interest in matters of re- 
source, administration, agriculture, finance, commerce, marine, and 
military, — such were the principal objects, according to his own 
avowal, which the emperor proposed to himself; such were the 
fruits which he counted on gathering from his voyage. 

Marie Antoinette was exceedingly happy at the thought of 
seeing her brother; he was for her an image of her country, a 
living portrait of her mother. But this joy, it must be said, was 
not unalloyed with some disquietude. What would Joseph II. 
think of the court of France? What would he think of the king? 
Above all, what would he think of the society of the queen, and 
of the manner of life which she had adopted ? What would be his 
sentence? What might he not perhaps reprove, — he who had 
one day written so severe a letter to his sister that Maria Theresa 
was obliged to prevent him from sending it? Might there not 
result bitternesses, coldnesses, perhaps even an open rupture? 
Such were Marie Antoinette's apprehensions and Mercy's fears. 

This journey of Joseph II. — which was several times aban- 
doned and taken up again, then put off at the last moment be- 
cause of the rigour of the winter and the political occurrences 
in Bohemia and Germany; which was disapproved of by Maria 
Theresa, who was not informed of it until after every one else — 
did not finally take place until the spring of 1777. The emperor 



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200 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

had resolved upon maintaining the most strict incognito in France, 
to the great grief of the queen, who would have wished to have 
her brother received according to his rank, as a great and powerful 
monarch, and to the great annoyance of the empress, who loved not 
his affectation of simplicity, which was more apparent than real. 
His decision in this respect had been official. No lodging in the 
palace at Versailles nor at Trianon ; at Paris an apartment with 
the ambassador, at the Petit Luxembourg, but all appearance of 
official reception was to be avoided ; at Versailles, two rooms in 
an hdtcl garni, the H6tel du Juste, which was decently furnished 
but without elegance; at the chiteau a small chamber in the 
queen's entresol, where he could take a few moments' rest during 
the day. No state coach, only a simple hired carriage. 

On Wednesday, April i8, at half-past seven in the evening, 
Joseph II. arrived at Paris, under the name of the Count von Falk- 
enstein. On the following morning at eight o'clock he set out for 
Versailles. In default of Mercy, who was kept in bed by an indis- 
position, the Abb6 de Vermond received the emperor on his de- 
scent from the carriage, and conducted him alone by a secret 
staircase to the room where the queen awaited him. ** I desire," 
Joseph II. had written, ** that she should await me in her boudoir 
without coming to meet me, and that there, in order to avoid a 
scene before others, we should be alone, to manifest to each 
other the pleasure which we have in seeing each other again.'* 
This pleasure was great; the meeting was touching. The brother 
and sister embraced each other tenderly, and remained for a 
moment without speaking. Then their hearts opened, and the 
interview became lively and confidential. The emperor, con- 
trary to all expectation, was tender and almost flattering. He 
said to the queen that if she were not his sister, and he could be 
united to her, he would not hesitate to marry again in order to 
gain so charming a companion. The young woman, the more 
touched by the compliment as she had not expected it, opened 
her heart and with unlooked-for abandon talked frankly of her 
situation, of her tastes, of her companions, only preserving a cer- 
tain reticence on the subject of her favourites. The ice was 
broken ; all embarrassment disappeared ; the conversation, which 
was intimate and confidential on the part of Marie Antoinette, 
affectionate and discreet on the part of Joseph II., was prolonged. 
The queen afterward led her brother to the king ; the two mon- 
archs embraced ; the king made a few remarks, which showed 



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CRITICISED BY JOSEPH II. 201 

his desire to appear cordial and sincere ; the emperor was sat- 
isfied, and from the first moment succeeded in putting the king 
at his ease. Then after visits to the princes and princesses of the 
royal family, and to the ministers, after a supper in the queen's 
apartments, the Count von Falkenstein returned to sleep at Paris. 
Thus passed the first day. 

During the following days the conversations between the em- 
peror and the queen were renewed ; sometimes at Trianon, in the 
intimacy of a solitary walk, sometimes at Versailles, Joseph II. 
took up in detail the subjects which he had already broached with 
his sister. He pointed out to her the dangers of her situation, 
drew a striking picture of the ease with which she allowed herself 
to be led on by her love of pleasure, and the deplorable conse- 
quences which her weakness would infallibly entail in the future, 
insisted upon the necessity of arresting herself on that declivity, 
of showing more deference toward the king, of giving up gaming, 
of applying herself to serious occupations, and, above all, shed a 
clear light upon the drawbacks of the queen's society. Of her set, 
the Due de Coigny alone found grace before the emperor; while 
the prince judged harshly, even too harshly, of Madame de Lam- 
balle, Madame de Polignac, and the Princesse de Gu^m^n^e, whose 
gambling-house he arraigned severely. The queen did not de- 
fend Madame de Lamballe, with whom she was then disenchanted, 
but she sought to pacify her brother on the score of Madame de 
G\i6m6n6e and Madame de Polignac. She acknowledged, more- 
over, without difficulty the justice of the emperor's reasons, for 
his discourse had really touched her and disposed her to serious 
reflections, and added that a day would come when she would 
follow such good advice. But owing to a feeling of pride she 
was reluctant to modify all at once her manner of life : she was 
afraid of seeming to yield to pressure. The public must not be 
able to say that the emperor had come from Austria to discipline 
and correct his little sister. 

The manner of Joseph II. warranted but too well such fears on 
the part of the queen. Of an absolute and dominating character, 
and more disposed to criticism than leniency, the august dictator 
was not always able to retain the cordial and affectionate tone 
which Mercy had recommended to him, and to which he had at 
first adhered. He forgot too readily that he had to do with an 
ardent and proud queen, to whom it was necessary to use the 
language of reason and kindness, instead of the severity and 



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202 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

rudeness which were natural to him ; and the queen, while recog- 
nizing the truth of her brother's observations, was often justly 
hurt by his manner of expressing them. It even happened to 
the emperor to give his sister a public lesson before several court- 
iers, and to say that if the king decided on visiting his kingdom, 
he need not bring his wife with him, ** who was of no use to him." 
At another time he declared before Mercy, in a tone singularly 
hard, that if he were the husband of the queen, he should know 
how to direct her wishes, and to give them the form which he 
desired. Such remarks were not of a kind to please the princess. 
Her legitimate susceptibility rebelled against his pedantic tone 
and his maladroit authority. " I should take everything respect- 
fully from my mother," she said ; " but as for my brother, I shall 
know how to answer him.'* Hence coldnesses, bitternesses, and 
momentary ruptures, and that declaration which the queen made 
to the emperor, half laughingly, half angrily, that if he prolonged 
his sojourn in France they should have many hot disputes. 

At bottom, however, she wished him to remain ; for she loved 
him despite his brusqueness, and did not deny that his counsels 
had been of use to her. She did all she could to retain him. 
She gave him a watch ornamented with her portrait; she offered 
him an entertainment at Trianon, — " an entertainment which was 
very well arranged," Mercy writes, ** and which was charming 
from the graciousness which the queen displayed toward every 
one." The king tried to be gay, and was as attentive to the em- 
peror as his disposition allowed. The English park was lighted 
by pans of fire hidden among the flowers ; and fagots burning 
behind the Temple of Love transformed it into a luminous drawing- 
room, whose brilliancy was reflected over the whole garden. 

Marie Antoinette took her brother to the Com^die Frangaise, 
and to the opera. At the latter, — it was on April 25, — Gluck's 
** Iphigenia in Aulis " was given. The emperor wished to remain 
hidden at the back of the box ; but the queen seized him by 
the hand and dragged him toward the front, and the parterre 
burst into such acclamations that the opera was interrupted 
during some moments. When it was resumed, they sang the 
chorus, " Sing, let us celebrate our queen." It was Joseph II.'s 
turn to join the applause which greeted his sister, and the public's 
to say that if the archduke had somewhat alienated French 
hearts from their sovereign, the emperor had given them back 
to her. 



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THE EMPEROR IN PARIS. 203 

The queen enjoyed this triumph and the growing popularity 
of her brother. Despite the care which the august traveller took 
to preserve his incognito, there were noisy demonstrations every- 
where along his route. His hotel was surrounded by a numerous 
crowd ; and wherever he went, a crowd followed him and impor- 
tuned him. The people were charmed with the simplicity of a 
prince who walked on foot through the streets, without appan- 
age or suite, dressed in a modest habit of green or plain brown 
cloth; they were grateful to him, they said, for setting so good 
an example to the court of France. By one of those inconsis- 
tencies of the French character, they admired in the brother what 
they thought a crime in the sister. The economists and the 
philosophers were inexhaustible in their praises of that emperor 
who shared their views and treated them as equals, — of that sov- 
ereign of a vast empire, who travelled as a philosopher and 
sought instruction rather than pleasure from his journey. Joseph 
II. cultivated these dispositions with care ; and if his sarcastic rail- 
lery against the fashions displeased certain ladies of the palace, 
if his sharp and public criticisms of the institutions and govern- 
ment seemed in bad taste to certain minds, if his sarcasms on the 
etiquette and customs of the court could only encourage his sister 
in a path which she was but too disposed to follow, — railleries and 
criticisms flattered the naturally fault-finding temper of the pub- 
lic, while his visits to the monuments, and his study of the work- 
ings of the administration and government, pleased those culti- 
vated spirits who dictated public opinion. 

The evenings of the emperor were devoted to the royal family; 
his days were reserved for himself and his instruction. Illustrious 
personages, celebrated places, public establishments, — he forgot 
nothing, visiting Necker and Madame Geoffrin, the Comtesse de 
Brionne and Madame du Barry, going to the Imprimerie Royale 
and to the Gobelins, to Sevres, to Ermenonville, to the school at 
Alfort, to the physical laboratories at Passy, to the garden of 
Mar^chal de Biron, and to Guimard's house. To Buffon, who 
was ill, he graciously said that he had come in search of that 
copy of his works which his brother Maximilian had forgotten. 
At the institution for deaf mutes he expressed his astonishment 
that the government had done nothing for so great a benefactor of 
mankind as the Ahh6 de Tfip^e. Sometimes he betook himself 
to the Academic Frangaise, where D'Alembert, under cover of a 
lecture on synonymy, addressed ingenious flatteries to him ; some- 



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204 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

times he was present as a spectator at the sittings of the Acad^mie 
des Inscriptions et Belies-Lettres, or at one at the Acad^mie des 
Sciences. Commerce, industry, government, finance, — he over- 
looked nothing in his investigations. Bertier de Sauvigny ex- 
plained to him in detail the organization of the administration ; 
Laborde, that of the royal treasury; Trudaine, the bridges and 
roads ; Vergennes, foreign affairs ; Sartines, the navy. The prince 
criticised several points, reproached the ministers for being too 
much master, each in his own department, so that when the king 
changed ministers, he only exchanged his bondage, and asserted 
that they sacrificed reality to appearance, utility to luxury, in their 
buildings ; but on the whole he discarded many prejudices. Paris 
charmed him; the nation did not displease him, notwithstanding 
its levity ; and if he had a poor opinion of those who governed, 
he conceived a high idea of the resources and means of the 
monarchy, were those resources and means only placed in com- 
petent hands. 

Unfortunately he did not perceive the competent hands. The 
ministers in power, despite the civil things he said to them, did 
not inspire him with confidence, and he dreaded the reinstate- 
ment of Choiseul. " If the Due de Choiseul had been in office, — 
to the satisfaction of the king and the lively displeasure of the 
queen, — his uneasy and turbulent head would have thrown the 
kingdom into great embarrassment." The archbishop of Tou- 
louse, Lom^nie de Brienne, alone inspired him with a high idea 
of his capacity, which fact does little honour to his imperial 
sagacity. As for the royal family, the caustic traveller judged 
them with excessive severity: the Comte de Provence seemed 
to him an "unaccountable creature;" the Comte d'Artois, a 
"dandy;" Mesdames, "good creatures, but nonentities." The 
king pleased him more; he had long conversations with him 
wherein the young monarch, after his first embarrassment, had 
talked to him in all confidence, even on the most delicate sub- 
jects, and had given proof of solid understanding. Nevertheless, 
in his private letters, he expressed himself in extremely harsh 
terms in speaking of his brother-in-law. ** This man," he wrote 
to Leopold, " is somewhat weak, but by no means imbecile ; he 
has ideas, he has judgment ; but there is a physical as well as 
mental apathy. He talks rationally enough, but has no desire to 
inform himself, no curiosity ; in fact, the fiat lux has not yet gone 
forth over that matter without form." This judgment was more 



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PUBLIC ENTHUSIASM FOR JOSEPH II. 20$ 



than harsh ; it was unjust If the qualities of the king were para- 
lyzed by his timidity, they were none the less genuine ; and if his 
accomplishments were not so brilliant as those of Joseph II., they 
\yere as extensive and probably more solid. 

The emperor had not pleased all the members of the royal 
family equally. While Madame Adelaide had dragged him into 
a closet on pretext of looking at some pictures, and then kissed 
him, telling him that such a mark of friendship might well be 
permitted to an old aunt, the Comte de Provence was but little 
attracted toward the queen's brother. 

" The emperor," he wrote to Gustavus III. " is mightily cajoling, a great 
maker of protestations and vows of friendship ; but on closer examination 
his protestations and his frank air hide the desire to pump one, as we say, 
and to dissemble his own sentiments, ... but maladroitly, for with a little 
incense, of which he is very greedy, far from his finding you out, you 
easily find him out. His accomplishments are very superficial." 

In reality it was perhaps Monsieur who best judged him ; he 
had divined the man beneath the mask. Joseph II. himself, in a 
private letter wherein he spoke unreservedly, naively disclosed 
his methods : — 

'* You are better than I," he wrote to his brother I-,eopold ; " but I am 
more of an impostor, and in this country one must be. As for me, I dis- 
semble from judgment and from modesty ; I even exaggerate to excess 
my r61e of appearing simple, natural, thoughtful. But that is what has 
excited an enthusiasm which is truly embarrassing." 

It would be difficult to avow more frankly that one had made 
sport of the public ; but the public, which judges only by appear- 
ances, was caught by these subterfuges. It manifested not only 
sympathy, but, as Joseph II. said, enthusiasm for him. Save 
among the friends of Choiseul, who could not pardon the trav- 
eller for having addressed only an insignificant remark to the 
former minister when he passed in the procession of the cheva- 
liers of the St. Esprit, and for having passed through Touraine 
without stopping at Chanteloup, while he had gone to see the 
Du Barry at Lucienne, the impression was everywhere the same. 
Every one ran afler the emperor ; all his actions were indications 
of wisdom ; all his words were indications of genius. " One 
repeated the commonplaces he uttered with an emphasis to 
make one die with laughing," a contemporary wrote ; *' all heads 
at Paris were turned." From Paris the infatuation spread to 



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206 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

the whole of France, and cast the Comte de Provence and the 
Comte d'Artois, who at that time were travelling through the 
middle and eastern part of the kingdom, into the shade. They 
literally went mad about the heir of the Hapsburgs. Who then 
thought of reproaching Marie Antoinette for being an Austrian ? 

It was necessary, however, to depart ; the emperor was begin- 
ning to have enough of his r61e ; and although Paris pleased him 
greatly, and he was proud of his success, he ended by growing 
tired of the perpetual ovations. Only one thing held him, the 
thing of which he had perhaps thought least on coming to France, 
— the charm he found in the companionship of the queen. 
That humbug, who affected simplicity and such fine indifference, 
had been caught by the charm of intercourse with Marie Antoi- 
nette. That inflexible censor had been disarmed by the bewitch- 
ing grace of that young sister whom he chid so harshly and railed 
at so piteously, but of whom his opinion became modified each 
day ; with the tenderness of heart which he knew she possessed, 
he discovered in her more wisdom and intelligence than he had 
expected. At the last moment he hesitated to go ; and in pro- 
portion as the hour of departure approached, his repugnance 
increased. 

The queen on her side could not contemplate without regret 
the departure of that brother whom she loved despite his scold- 
ings, and whose counsels she appreciated despite their gruffness ; 
it seemed to her like a final rupture of family ties. It was on 
May 31, in the evening, after a long day passed together in 
serious conversation, that they said farewell, Joseph II. was 
moved ; Marie Antoinette made a violent effort to hide her grief, 
but she was choking. On embracing the king, the emperor said 
to him in a broken voice that he urgently commended to him a 
sister whom he loved tenderly ; that he would never be tranquil 
unless he knew that she was happy. At midnight he left the 
chateau to return to his hdtel. On the following morning, at six 
o'clock, he set out from Versailles for St.-Germain-en-Laye, where 
he rejoined his suite. The queen was prostrated. She had wished 
to control herself before her brother ; but when he was gone, she 
could no longer control herself, and had a violent attack of hys- 
terics. On the following day, she went to hide her grief at 
Trianon with her two friends, Madame de Polignac and Madame 
de Lamballe, On her return, she was present at the benediction, 
and walked alone with the Comtesse Jules as far as Rocquencourt; 



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JOSEPH II. LEAVES HER WRITTEN ADVICE. ^0/ 

she had need of regaining possession of herself and of distracting 
her thoughts. 

In the mean while Joseph II. continued his way across the 
provinces, which he visited in their turn, but he was not less 
touched than Marie Antoinette ; and he wrote to his mother with 
an effusiveness which revealed his state of mind : — 

" I quitted Versailles with grief, having become veritably attached to 
my sister ; I found there a certain sweetness of life which I had renounced, 
but for which I see I have not lost the taste. She is amiable and charm- 
ing; I passed hours and hours with her, without perceiving how they 
flew. Her emotion on my departure was great, her self-control admi- 
rable ; it required all my force to find legs wherewitli to go away." 

Maria Theresa had indeed foreseen it ; the emperor had fallen 
under the queen's charm. With the wish on parting to prolong 
in some way the serious intercourse which they had had together 
during the six weeks of his sojourn, and their unreserved inti- 
macy, he had made out, on the request of his sister, and despite 
the observations of Mercy, who would have preferred a more 
simple form, some advice, or rather a long instruction, which he 
left to her in writing, under the title, " Reflections given to the 
Queen of France." 

This instruction, a veritable catechism of her conscience, pre- 
sented to the young princess her duties under two heads, — first, 
as wife, second, as queen. The emperor avoided with care all 
direct reproach ; he laid down principles and asked questions. 
It was for his sister to reply to them and to see whether she ful- 
filled as was fitting the duties of her station. But under this 
indirect form, it is easy to perceive the personalities. It was not 
a catechism for the use of all women, nor even for all queens ; it 
was for the exclusive use of Marie Antoinette, and Joseph 11.' 
showed himself therein, beyond doubt, a clear-sighted judge, but 
severe to excess, not to say unjust. A few quotations from some 
of the most important passages will suffice to give an idea of it. 

" What hold have you," the emperor asked, " over the heart of the 
king, and, above all, over his esteem? Examine yourself: Do you use 
every effort to please him ? Do you study his desires, his character, in 
order to conform thereto? Do you seek to make him enjoy your com- 
pany and the pleasures which you procure for him, and which without you 
he would find void, in preference to everything and all other kinds of 
amusement ? Does he see your affection occupied solely with him, with 



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208 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

making him shine without the least thought of yourself? Do you curb 
your desire to shine at his expense, to be affable when he is not ? 

"Are you clinging, tender, when you are with him? Do you seek 
occasions, do you respond to the sentiments which he allows you to per- 
ceive? Do you make him your confidant? Do you never abuse or repel 
the confidences which he makes to you ? Do you act in a similar manner 
and tell him everything, or at least enough for him to hear of what con- 
cerns you and interests him, first from you rather than fi-om another per- 
son? Do you give up things when you see that he desires it? Do you 
ever misuse your power ? ... All your power should be hidden ; one 
should suspect it, acting and influencing everything, but one should see 
it in nothing. The king alone, your husband, should by his position act, 
and you should never appear in anything. 

" Do you sufficientiy study his character? Do you try to know what 
he does when he is alone? Do you know the people and things he pre- 
fers? Do you try not to bother him, and, above aJl, never to allow your 
presence to inconvenience him ? Try to procure for the king those com- 
panions who please him ; they should be yours ; and if he has any preju- 
dice against any one, even of your friends, you should sacrifice them. 
Finally, your only object . . . should be the fiiendship, the confidence, 
of the king. 

" As queen you have a glorious occupation ; you should fulfil the duties 
of your station. Decency, the formation of the court, and, above all, 
appearances, should receive great consideration. The respect which 
your private life and decorum may command is important ; they form the 
two grounds for the public judgment . . . Have not your manners been 
somewhat too light? Have you not adopted at the court some of the 
fashions that were in vogue when you came here, or those of several 
ladies, who, although amiable and respectable, should not serve as models 
for you, for you cannot find a model outside of your station ? The more 
serious the king is, the more should the court seem to model itself upon 
him. Have you weighed the consequences of your visits to the salons of 
those ladies where promiscuous company is assembled, and whose charac- 
ter is not respected? Have you thought of the effect which your intimacy 
and friendship, if they are not bestowed upon persons altogether irre- 
proachable and trustworthy, may have upon the public? The choice of 
friends is exceedingly difficult, and, above all, in your position, you should 
seek to bind.to you men who are as accomplished as they are trustworthy, 
and totally free from ambition and desire. . . • 

" Have you weighed the frightful consequences of gambling, the com- 
pany which it brings together, the tone which prevails, and finally the 
confusion which it is sure to cause in the fortune and habits of a whole 
nation? . . . 

** Also deign to think a moment of the inconvenience which you have 



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ADVICE OF JOSEPH II. 209 

already experienced at the balls at the opera. ... I must avow that this is 
the point on which I have found those who love you, and think honestly, 
the most shocked. The king deserted for a whole night at Versailles, and 
you mingling in promiscuous society, and lost in the rabble of Paris I 

" But while disillusioning you from many so-called amusements, may I 
dare, my dear sister, to substitute another, which is worth them all ? This 
is reading. 

** Look upon this occupation as the most important, and choose books 
which will make* you think, and improve your mind. . . . Reading will take 
the place of all, and those two hours of calm will give you time to reflect 
and to discover by your penetration all that you have to do or not to do 
during the remainder of the twenty-two. . . . Reading and rational com- 
panionship make up the happiness of life. 

" Refrain, my sister, from speaking ill of your neighbour, which one 
finds so amusing. ... By ill-natured remarks about one's neighbour one 
estranges honest men. . . . Avoid, I beseech you, such discourse, and, 
above all, the curiosity of wishing to know everything. . . . 

" I implore you, be chary of your recommendations ; this is a very 
delicate point You may be guilty of the most crying injustice without 
thinking of it, and for one, often, whom it is of no importance for you to 
oblige, you may disgust honest men. . . . Save your influence for great 
occasions ; and on the litde ones courageously resist the solicitations which 
are made you, and, finally, do not take any one's part with warmth. . . . 

" Politeness and affability, my dear sister, have their limits, and are only 
of value in proportion as they are distributed and used wisely. You must 
use discretion therein, and think of your situation and of your nation, which 
is too inclined to be familiar, and to eat out of your hand." 

One must admit it ill became that prince who had just posed 
as the apostle of simplicity to complain of the familiarity of the 
French nation, to reproach the queen for her contempt of eti- 
quette and her solitary walks with an intimate companion with- 
out the equipage of her rank, as it also seems strange to see that 
philosophical emperor recommending his sister to show herself 
pious and devoted to the Church, and adding that the greatest 
infidel should do so out of policy. It was more in his r61e and 
nearer the truth when he pointed out the drawbacks of her con- 
stant intercourse with young people, and her too ready reception 
of foreigners, especially of Englishmen, whose customs and man- 
ners were then in fashion, to the great displeasure of the king. 

"This must shock the nation," he said, "and produce a bad effect 
abroad. . . . One will attribute your affability to a coquetry which is de- 
sirous of pleasing every one, and runs after the applause of the crowd, 
VOL. 1. — 14 

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210 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

while lacking the approbation of sensible people, to whose opinion the 
crowd always returns in the end." 

He finally finished in these terms : — 

" Cultivate harmony and friendship in all the family, but avoid too great 
familiarity, and, above all, the seduction of hot-headed persons who wish 
to have you share their life in order to cover up their follies with your 
authority. Such follies are horse-races, frequent visits to Paris, the balls 
at the opera, the hunts in the Bois de Boulogne, all those gay parties in 
which the king does not join, and which certainly and with reason give 
him no sort of pleasure. 

*• Remember that you are his wife, that you are queen, and do not forget 
the tender brother and friend who has said all this to you, who is separated 
from you by three hundred leagues, and almost without hope of seeing you 
again, but who loves you, and will love you all his life, more than himself. 

•* Here are the observations which I have made. You were bom to be 
happy, virtuous, and perfect ; but it is time, and more than time, to reflect, 
and to adopt a mode of life which you can continue. You are growing 
older ; you have no longer the excuse of youth. What will you become 
if you wait longer? An unhappy woman, a more unhappy princess ; and as 
for him who loves you more than anything in the world, you will break his 
heart. I could never accustom myself to knowing you were not happy." 

Never, perhaps, was a more severe accusation under a more 
affectionate form addressed to the court of France and to Marie 
Antoinette at that period of her life which we have called the 
period of dissipation. No more complete arsenal ever furnished 
the enemies of the queen with arms against her. We must not, 
however, take all these reproaches of Joseph II., disguised under 
the apparent form of advice, literally. All the inconveniences 
which he pointed out did not exist, and by no means to the 
extent which the acerbity of his criticism would seem to indicate. 
At the moment of leaving France, being desirous of arresting 
his sister in the unfortunate course he saw her pursuing, he 
thought it necessary, in order to move her more profoundly, to 
draw a frightful picture of the abuses which had shocked him; 
and with this intention, which accorded with his nature, inclined 
to exaggeration, he so far forced the colour of the picture as to 
talk of her advancing age, which left her no excuse, — her age of 
twenty-two ! He wrote ab irato under the influence of the im- 
pressions which he had just received. This page must have been 
written after a conversation with Mercy, another on his return from 
a card-party at the house of the Princesse de Gu^m^n^e, or after 



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JOSEPH II.'S REAL OPINION OF HEJl. 211 

a horse-race organized by the Comte d'Artois. He wished to 
strike hard, and did not always strike justly. 

If we wish to have Joseph II/s true appreciation of Marie An- 
toinette at this epoch, we must not seek it in these instruc- 
tions, or even in his first letters to Leopold, — in which, while 
acknowledging that the queen was a very pretty and amiable 
woman, of an exact and even austere virtue, he reproached her 
for not fulfilling as she ought her functions as wife and queen, 
and of running from dissipation to dissipation, among which 
there were none indeed that were not perfectly lawful, but many 
of which were none the less dangerous, — but in those which he 
wrote after leaving Versailles, but before quitting France, when, 
far from the noise of the court and the vortex of the society about 
the queen, he could judge calmly, in silence, reflection, and soli- 
tude, and when a more distant point of view allowed him to correct 
his first impression. Here is what he sent from Brest, on June 9, 
to Leopold, — to that brother from whom he hid nothing: — 

" I left Paris without regret, although I was marvellously well treated 
there. ... As for Versailles, that cost me more; for I had become 
veritably attached to my sister, and I saw her grief at our separation, which 
increased my own. She is an amiable and good woman, somewhat youth- 
ful, somewhat heedless, but she has a fund of honesty and virtue truly 
admirable at her age ; besides this, an intelligence and clearness of pene- 
tration which often astonished me. Her first impulse is always right ; if she 
yielded to it, reflected a little more, and listened less to those people who 
influence her, of whom there are hosts and of diflerent sorts, she would 
be perfect:' 

" I parted from the queen with much pain," he wrote on the same day 
to his sister, Marie Christine ; " she is indeed a charming woman, and 
without her face would still please by her manner of expressing herself, and 
the spiciness which she knows how to impart to everything she says." 

And six weeks later, on entering Vienna, the emperor reiterated 
to Maria Theresa how much he had been pleased with his dear 
and beautiful queen, and that if he could find a woman like her 
he would immediately marry for the third time. This is far 
removed from the biting criticisms of the " Reflections given to 
the Queen of France." 

On receiving these instructions from her brother, Marie An- 
toinette's first movement was one of anger; she cried that she 
would be answerable to all that her conduct had always been 
well-considered and rational. Soon, however, came reflection ; all 

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212 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

bitterness disappeared, and the best resolutions were made. The 
queen determined to stop little by little frequenting the salon of 
the Princesse de Gu6m6n6e, to abstain from high play, to spend a 
few hours of the day at home in order to be more constantly with 
the king than in the past ; and, in fact, during the first weeks she 
made a genuine effort to reform, — no more visits to Paris, no 
more gambling, an evident and delicate attention toward the 
king, whom she accompanied to the hunt and on his journeys 
to St. Hubert; the Princesse de Gu6m6n6e was deserted to such 
an extent that she resented it ; there was greater dignity in the 
appearance of the court and marks of deference to old persons 
and persons of rank. Still better, the queen seemed to have 
acquired a taste for reading. She studied English history, and 
afterward had serious conversations with the Ahh6 de Vermond 
of more than two hours' length. During the journey to Choisy 
the affability of the young sovereign was remarked, — more atten- 
tion to the choice of persons admitted to pay their court, more 
reserve in bestowing marks of favour, more care to be impartial ; 
and the rule of conduct which the emperor had left was re-read 
from time to time. 

But these good resolutions were soon broken ; the temptations 
revived; Marie Antoinette first resisted, then fell. The Comte 
d'Artois, on his return from his journey in the east, regained 
favour, and his influence was again exerted over the queen, 
who submitted to it, although with regret. He organized the 
court amusements, and was by no means always prudent. Dur- 
ing the summer of 1777 the heat was oppressive. To escape 
from it, the court used to repair to the terrace at Versailles in 
the eyening, where the band of the French and Swiss Guards 
played at ten o'clock. The royal family mingled with the 
crowd which these concerts attracted to the chateau ; the queen 
and the princesses walked there without suite, sometimes to- 
gether, sometimes with one of their ladies on their arm. The 
king had gone once or twice; these solitary promenades had 
pleased him, and it had been his example that had authorized 
them. It was none the less true that they were open to objec- 
tion. ** In a nation where youth was so hot-headed and indis- 
creet," as Mercy justly observed, '* one could not be too much 
on guard against occasions that might be misconstrued." Marie 
Antoinette found this out to her cost. These promenades on the 
terrace at Versailles, innocent though they were, served as pre- 



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DISREGARDS HER BROTHER'S ADVICE. 213 

texts for the most odious imputations against the honour of the 
queen; they made possible and perhaps inspired the scene 
enacted later in the affair of the necklace. 

There were more serious causes for concern. Hardly six 
months after the emperor's departure, things were going little 
better than before his arrival. In vain he wrote to his sister to 
remind her of her promises; his letters remained without re- 
sponse, or she replied to them only by evasions. The journey 
to Fontainebleau, which was always a critical period, did not 
present fewer dangers in 1777 than in previous years: recom- 
mendations to the ministers, influence of the favourites, an afflu- 
ence of young Englishmen, horse-races, late hours, — everything 
had fallen again into its old course. Gambling especially had 
attained to frightful proportions ; the chief talk in Paris was of 
the large sums lost at faro by certain of the courtiers, by the 
Due de Chartres, by the sovereign herself. Not that there were 
not from time to time a return to prudence and intervals of re- 
action in her dissipation ; but these times were only so many 
points of departure whence the current that bore along the young 
princess took a fresh start and hurried on even more impetuously, 
it would seem, for having been retarded a moment. The coun- 
sellors of the queen were distressed ; Mercy exhausted himself 
in vain remonstrances ; the Abb^ de Vermond made an excuse 
for not going to Fontainebleau ; and Maria Theresa, heart-broken, 
wrote to her ambassador, ** Perhaps nothing but a positive mis- 
fortune will ever make her change her course ; but is it not to be 
feared that the change may come too late ? " 

And yet for that very journey to Fontainebleau, Marie Antoi- 
nette had made the wisest resolutions with the best faith in the 
world. At bottom she did not care for gambling ; she was dis- 
gusted with horse-racing ; she was tired of all those amusements ; 
she had no personal fondness for the Comte d'Artois, who was 
the promoter of them ; and it was not without real chagrin that 
she allowed herself to be led on by those about her. But she 
was young; she was lively; she carried in her heart a grief which 
had consumed her for seven years. For a moment she had be- 
lieved herself to be pregnant ; of her own accord she had imme- 
diately reminded Mercy of all her plans of reform, of all the wise 
and firm resolutions she had determined to adopt under such cir- 
cumstances. Disappointed in her hopes, she had thrown herself 
anew into the vortex of amusements, in order to escape her dis- 



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214 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

appointment, and, above all, to escape from herself. Vexed with 
her husband, whose apathy and coldness constantly disappointed 
her desires, she had come to regard him as a character without 
spring and as a person of no consequence, for whom it was use- 
less to put one's self out, since she could rule him by his timidity, — 
an error of the imagination rather than of the heart ; the thought- 
less anger of a young woman, irritated and nervous, driven to 
extremities by successive deceptions ; a morbid state of mind 
which we do not undertake to justify, but which maybe explained 
perhaps by the repressed irritation induced by her unhappy situa- 
tion when compared with the fecundity of the Comtesse d*Artois, 
who was then pregnant for the third time. Such was Mercy's 
opinion, when after enumerating the drawbacks of a sojourn at 
Fontainebleau, he wrote to Maria Theresa, — 

•* It is always to the event of her pregnancy that I turn in the hope of 
a change for the better, and it will be then that the queen will of herself 
adopt those ideas which up to the present have not been urged upon her 
with the success one could desire." 



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CHAPTER XVI. 

The War of Succession in Bavaria. — Death of the Elector.— 
Joseph II. occupies Lower Bavaria; his Mother's Disapproval 
OF it. — Armaments of Frederick II. — Feeling in France. — 
Marla Theresa implores her Daughter's Intervention. — 
Futile Negotiations. — Declaration of War. — Marie Antoi- 
nette DEMANDS THE MEDIATION OF FRANCE; SUDDEN CESSATION OF 

HER Appeals. — Interview with Maurepas. — Statement of the 

COMTE DE la MARCK AND OF THE CoUNT VON GOLTZ. — THE 

True Extent of the Queen's Intervention in the Affair of 
Bavaria. — The Peace of Teschen. 

IT was not solely for the pleasure of seeing his august sister, nor 
of visiting the cities and public establishments, that Joseph 
II. had made that sojourn in France which, as Louis XVI. wrote 
to Vergennes, was to make the king of Prussia so furiously 
jealous. There was a secret and more political aim: the 
emperor wished to see for himself what were the dispositions 
and resources of his ally, and to strengthen the union of the 
cabinets of Vienna and Versailles in case of future eventualities. 
If he had allowed himself to say, as the wicked tongue of Fred- 
erick II. asserted, which, however, it is difficult to believe, that 
the king of France was an " imbecile or a child," he none the less 
felt that that imbecile and child was at the head of one of the 
first powers of Europe, and that it was essential for him to gain 
his confidence. Consequently he had neglected nothing to arrive 
at this end; and he would seem to have almost succeeded. 
Louis XVI. had opened his heart with all cordiality and frank- 
ness to his imperial brother-in-law, — sometimes on the subject of 
the queen, whose charming qualities he was pleased to praise, 
sometimes on matters of government, which he treated with 
clearness and unexpected precision. " If I had desired it," the 
illustrious traveller said on leaving one of these conferences, ** the 
king would have shown me his papers, and all I could have 
wished to know of his affairs." But there was one subject on 

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2l6 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

which the French monarch had remained obstinately silent ; and 
this was precisely concerning the affairs of Germany, — there was 
the difficulty. 

Austria had always meditated an aggrandizement on the side 
of Bavaria ; and the death, which was then imminent, of the Elector 
Maximilian Joseph seemed to open the door for the realization 
of this dream. Maximilian had no direct heir; his future suc- 
cessor, the elector-palatine, Charles Theodore, was far away, 
and without power. Joseph II. counted on profiting by the situa- 
tion to take possession of certain districts, to which he claimed 
to have rights whose origin dated back to the fifteenth century. 
In the course of 1777 negotiations had been opened with Charles 
Theodore to obtain this concession amicably; and the palatine, 
content to assure his tranquil possession of the rest of the States 
of Bavaria by means of a partial sacrifice, was upon the point 
of consenting, when, on Dec. 30, 1777, Maximilian died. His 
death precipitated matters. The emperor hastened to sign, on 
Jan. 3, 1778, his treaty with Charles Theodore; and on the 
iSth, twelve thousand Austrian troops took possession of the 
district which had been ceded in Lower Bavaria. " The death 
of the elector gives us much to do," Joseph II. sent word to Mercy 
on January 5. ** It is one of those occasions which only occur 
once in an age, and which we must not neglect." And he wrote a 
few days later to his brother Leopold, " It is a true coup (fitat^ 
and an addition to the monarchy of inestimable value." 

It was Joseph II. alone who wished to enter upon this affair, 
in which he was, according to his own expression, the " prime 
mover." The Prince von Kaunitz only lent himself to it with 
repugnance; and Maria Theresa, strong in her experience and 
wisdom, disapproved entirely of her son's ambition. She could 
not understand how one could expose one's self to a war in order 
to uphold uncertain and superannuated pretensions. An amicable 
negotiation might pass ; but an armed occupation was entirely 
contrary to her disposition. 

"The present situation," she wrote to the emperor on January 2, "far 
from oflfering a happy, open, and peaceful prospect, overwhelms me with 
a crowd of reflections which I cannot rid myself of, and which, if I did not 
tell you, would make me reproach myself all my life. It concerns the happi- 
ness and tranquillity, not only of the people committed to my care, but also 
of all Germany. ... If our pretensions to Bavaria were better founded 
and more solid than they are, I should still hesitate to enkindle a universal 



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ARMAMENTS OF FREDERICK II. 21/ 

fire for our private advantage. Judge how many ill-founded and super- 
annuated rights, as the minister has said, and as you know as well as I, must 
be taken into consideration in order not to occasion disputes which may 
bring so many misfortunes in their train. ... I speak only from my expe- 
rience in politics, and as a mother I should not oppose arranging this afiair 
by means of compromise, negotiation, and agreement, but never by means 
of arms or force, — a method which would set all the world against us, and 
justly, from the first step, and would lose to us even those who would have 
remained neutral. I have never seen any such enterprise prosper, with 
the exception of that against me in 1741, when Silesia was lost . . . 
I see, therefore, no drawback in deferring the marching of the troops, but 
a great many disadvantages in precipitating it." 

This was the language of reason ; but Joseph II. was too im- 
petuous to listen to it. It seemed to him that his desires could 
encounter no obstacles; that the circumstances being favourable 
and all Europe engaged, this coup must succeed without war ; and 
that the acquisition, although still incomplete, would be but the 
more excellent for having cost nothing. 

A strange illusion which events were not long in dispelling ! 
At the first news of the invasion of Lower Bavaria, Frederick II. 
massed an army on the frontiers of Bohemia, ready to invade it 
if the emperor insisted upon his scheme of aggrandizement. The 
elector of Saxony, who also had pretensions, on the side of his 
mother, to the succession of Maximilian, joined his troops to 
those of the king of Prussia; the Due des Deux-Ponts, another 
heir of the elector, protested on his side against the arrangements 
made; and the Bavarians themselves, loyal to their antipathy 
against Austria, refused to accept a change of domination. ** The 
last Bavarian peasant has an aversion for Austria and good-will 
toward France," the Marquis de Bombelles, minister from France 
to the Diet of Ratisbon, wrote to the Baron de Breteuil, am- 
bassador to Vienna. Under the inspiration of Prussia, Germany 
was aroused. In France the feeling was not less profound. The 
old prejudices against the imperial avariciousness still existed, 
carefully cultivated by Frederick II. and his ambassador, the 
Count von Goltz ; and Joseph II. was not ignorant of it, since on 
Jan. 5, 1778, he wrote to Mercy on announcing his project to 
him, '* This will not greatly please the nation with whom you 
are." The feeling was warm, and the most ardent began to talk 
of renovating their equipage of war. The queen herself, on the 
first news of the death of the elector, wrote to Madame de 



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2l8 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

Polignac that she feared greatly lest her brother " might be up 
to some of his tricks." The king did not hide his displeasure. 
" The ambition of your relatives is going to upset everything," 
he said to his wife : ** they began with Poland ; now Bavaria is 
the second volume. I am sorry for it on your account." And 
the French ministers received orders to announce to the courts to 
which they were accredited that the dismemberment of Bavaria 
was made against the will of the cabinet of Versailles, which dis* 
approved of it highly. 

This was only the logical corollary, authorized by the circum- 
stances, of the instructions given on April lo, 1775, by Monsieur 
de Vergennes, to the Marquis de Bombelles, on his departure for 
Ratisbon as French minister. 

" The king," he had said to him, " loyal to the principles which have 
ruled their Imperial Majesties, will neglect nothing to strengthen and ren- 
der more inviolable the ties which assure the peace of Germany ; but in 
fulfilling these engagements, he does not believe himself to be released from 
those which had previously been formed with the Germanic body in the 
treaty of Westphalia. 

** His Majesty had not ceased to recommend to his minister to the Diet, 
as well as to his other ministers residing at the courts of the princes of the 
empire, to declare that his alliance with the House of Austria was founded 
upon the treaty of Westphalia and upon the Germanic constitutions ; that 
his Majesty regarded it as one of his first maxims to allow no attack to be 
made thereon ; that far from wishing to serve as an instrument to any 
schemes of oppression which the imperial court might form, his Majesty 
regarded the alliance rather as a means of serving the cause of the States to 
better purpose.'' 

At this critical juncture the former energy of Maria Theresa 
reappeared unimpaired. She regretted that her son had raised the 
question ; but the affair once engaged, she exerted herself, with all 
the vivacity of her maternal love and of her patriotism, to prevent 
any evil consequences. It was to France that she first turned. She 
had used every effort to strengthen the alliance, and it seemed to 
her only just that the young princess who was the heart of it should 
serve to consolidate it, or at least to prevent its being broken. 
If in the beginning she had some scruples in thus involving her 
daughter in politics ; if she feared that by her indiscreet interfer- 
ence she might make herself importunate, and even suspected by 
the king, — her scruples were soon dissipated, and she brought to 
bear on Marie Antoinette all the ardour of a sovereign who trem- 

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HER INTERCESSION IMPLORED FOR AUSTRIA. 219 

bles for her people, of a mother who trembles for her sons, all 
the cleverness of a woman of genius, who, as an old politician and 
cognizant of the heart of her daughter to its most secret fold, 
knew to a marvel what chord to touch, what sentiments invoke, 
to make of that daughter a devoted ally and a docile instrument 
There were no more severities or reprimands, such as her corre- 
spondence usually contained ; there were the most tender caresses, 
touching prayers, pathetic appeals ; her letters were true master- 
pieces of feminine and maternal diplomacy. She brought every- 
thing into play, — the vanity of Marie Antoinette, her affection 
for her mother, her natural antipathy to the king of Prussia, every- 
thing, even to her hopes of pregnancy, which then for the first 
time were making her heart tremble. 

The affair was as yet only in the beginning; but a conflict 
threatened; Mercy was ill; the queen alone could checkmate 
the manoeuvres of Frederick, who feared her alone, and prevent 
a rupture between France and Austria, which would be a mortal 
blow to the empress. Marie Antoinette, who hitherto had al- 
ways refused to interfere in affairs, interested herself warmly in 
this, and did so solely from affection for her mother. It was 
her heart, — as she said herself, — it was her heart alone that 
prompted her to act. She was disturbed, uneasy; she turned 
pale on reading this phrase, " Any change in our alliance would 
kill me." 

Maria Theresa knew this, and profited by the affection of her 
daughter. See the picture she draws, — the empress writing at 
five o'clock in the morning; the courier waiting at her door; 
there is not a moment to lose to checkmate the black machina- 
tions of Prussia. She counts alone upon the justice of the king, 
and on his tenderness for his dear little wife. Never was it more 
important to keep intact the interests of the two houses and the 
two States ; the existence of the emperor and of his brothers, 
and the health of the empress, depend upon it. It was necessary, 
above all, to prevent a war, the mere idea of which made her 
succumb. What else might one not fear? Maria Theresa loves 
her son-in-law too well to wish to involve him in an enterprise 
opposed to his interests or to his glory. 

Marie Antoinette spoke to her husband, but with a certain 
indifference ; she only yielded to what was demanded of her — 
it is the Prussian minister who informs us — after she had been 
tormented to excess. And even then her actions were neither 

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220 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

sufficiently precise nor sustained, nor prompt enough, to satisfy 
Mercy. Where was that firm will which one had a right to ex- 
pect from her? What eternal remorse if she should neglect any 
means that could add to the satisfaction or repose of her august 
mother I Why content herself with what the king said to the 
Count von Goltz, that he did not wish to have anything to do 
with the affairs of his master? It was not sufficient that he should 
have nothing to do with the affairs of Prussia ; it was necessary 
to have something to do with those of Austria, as befitted a good 
and faithful ally. 

Nor was this all. Joseph II. entered the scene in his turn; he 
sent letter upon letter to his sister. " Since you do not wish to 
prevent the war," he wrote to her in a tragic tone, ** we shall 
fight as brave men ; and under all circumstances, my dear sister, 
you will have no cause to blush for your brother, who will ever 
merit your esteem." 

The queen was touched to tears on reading these lines ; her 
lively imagination pictured her brother in danger, her mother in 
tears. Agitated and trembling, she sought the king; she sent 
for the ministers; she spoke to them forcibly; she demanded a 
definite declaration, which alone could prevent a conflict. But 
toward what end were her energies in fact directed ? Toward 
gaining for the Lower Countries a guarantee which both the king 
and his ministers had already resolved upon. 

On his side, Frederick II. did not remain inactive; in the 
month of August, 1777, he made overtures to the Marquis de 
Joucourt, envoy extraordinary from France. He had his friends 
at the court of Versailles ; he had his spies; he had his minister, 
the Count von Goltz, who watched the queen, who sought to sur- 
prise the most private secrets of the royal couple, even the mys- 
teries of the alcove, — Goltz, who was all eyes and all ears, who 
spread and cleverly used the remarks, more or less authentic, 
attributed to Joseph II. concerning the nonentity of Louis XVI. 
"This is the moment to display all your strength," Frederick 
wrote to him on Feb. 11, 1778; "it is necessary that the 
deaf should hear, the blind should see, the apathetic should 
act." Goltz redoubled his efforts; he wrung from Vergennes 
a despatch which Maurepas himself declared to be ** hard 
and bad," wherein France declined all application of the casus 
foederis to Austria. The queen heard of it, and was indignant; 
she pressed the ministers, and obtained from them, with the con- 
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MARIA THERESA'S FEARS. 221 

sent of the king, a new despatch, more amicable in form, but 
scarcely different in matter, and which did not stipulate for that 
guarantee of the Lower Countries which we have spoken of 
above. 

No progress was made, however. On the instance of his 
mother, Joseph II. had written, in vain, in his own hand to the 
king of Prussia ; this correspondence only served to redouble the 
distrust and bitterness of the two adversaries, and the situation 
continued to be strained. European diplomacy was active; 
Russia saw a means of insinuating herself into the affairs of Ger- 
many, and of turning toward St. Petersburg the eyes hitherto 
turned toward Versailles. This power, which had been late in 
entering the European concert, visibly leaned toward Prussia. 
Maria Theresa was alarmed ; she feared lest France, whom she 
found cold, should be seduced in its turn by Frederick. She 
said : — 

**He uses every cajolery and advance possible, — every one knows 
this, — so long as he wishes to arrive at his object ; but once there, h^ acts 
in exactly the contrary manner, and never keeps his word. F'rance has had 
some experience of this, as have all the people of Europe, with the excep- 
tion of Russia, whom he fears. Let no one rely upon the latter ; she fol- 
lows the same methods as the king, and the heir is even more Prussian 
than his so-called father, or his mother, who has somewhat recovered from 
her mania, but not enough to expect anything from her against the king of 
Prussia, even protestations, — very lavish of smooth words, which mean 
nothing, after the manner of the Greeks, graca fides. 

" These are the two powers which you wish to substitute for us good, hon- 
est Germans. We have the same interests of family and State. ... It 
would be exceedingly unfortunate if the peace of Europe depended upon 
two powers so notorious in their maxims and principles, even in the gov- 
ernment of their own subjects ; and our holy religion would receive the 
last blow, and manners and good faith would have to hide themselves 
among the barbarians." 

After this picture, " which was not exaggerated," the empress 
adroitly insinuates that in the end the court of Versailles would 
gain from the alliance as much d& the court of Vienna, and that 
Austria, if pushed to extremities and abandoned by her friends, 
might turn to her adversaries, and join the party *' in order to 
have her share of the cake." At the same time, and what was 
more menacing, England had sent to her ministers in Germany 
the order to conciliate Austria as much as possible. This was a 



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222 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

serious danger at the very moment when the war in America had 
just broken out. What would happen if Joseph II., irritated and 
naturally little sympathetic toward France, urged by the remarks 
which were daily circulated in his army against the French, yielded 
to these suggestions; if an alliance were established between 
Vienna and London ; and if they had to add the preoccupations 
of a continental war to those of a maritime war, which were then 
absorbing the entire attention of the cabinet of Versailles ? Marie 
Antoinette, in seeking to maintain the Franco-Austrian alliance 
on the moderate conditions which we have just pointed out, would 
be furthering the interests both of the country of her adoption 
and those of her native land. And in fact what was the end at 
that moment for which French diplomacy was striving? Here 
it is, as stated in a despatch from Vergennes to Bombelles on June 
29, 1 778 : " The king continues to use every effort to the end 
that the spirit of justice and moderation may prevail, and that the 
tranquillity of Germany may be maintained." 

These efforts failed ; war was declared. On July 5 Frederick 
II. entered Nachod in Bohemia, and on the 7th, the first shots 
were fired. Maria Theresa was wild with anxiety; she knew that 
the Prussian army was stronger by forty thousand men than the 
Austrian army, and that in face of a warrior like Frederick, the 
military talents of Joseph II. would count for but little. 

"This is stronger than I am," she wrote to her son Ferdinand. " I am 
broken-hearted. I tremble at every door that slams, at every carriage that 
passes quickly, at every woman who walks in haste. I preach to myself; 
I try to find myself such as I was thirty-six years ago ; but I was young 
then, 1 had a husband, who took the place of everything to me. Weakened 
by my years and my reverses, my health no longer sustains me ; my soul 
alone through religion resigns itself and acts, but does not revive me." 

Mercy was immediately advised of the great news. *' I dare 
not dwell upon it too much to the queen," the empress wrote to 
him, ** for fear of exciting and moving her." But the ambassador 
had not the same scruples ; he sent the despairing note of her 
mother to Marie Antoinette. The queen, greatly distressed, 
burst into tears ; she countermanded an entertainment which she 
was to give at Trianon, and intervention from a high quarter was 
necessary in order to keep her from renouncing the distractions 
which the state of her health and the beginning of her pregnancy 
rendered necessary. The king in alarm came to her, himself 



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MARIA THERESA'S EFFORTS FOR PEACE. 223 

bathed in tears, and assured her that he wished to do everything 
in his power to lessen her grief. Thus encouraged by her hus- 
band, the young woman sent for Maurepas. She spoke to him 
firmly ; and when the old minister tried to find refuge in his usual 
evasions, ** This is the fourth or fifth time, Monsieur, that I have 
spoken to you of this affair," Marie Antomette replied imperi- 
ously. ** You have never made any other response ; until now I 
have been patient, but matters grow too serious, and I will no 
longer support such defeats." And recapitulating from the be- 
ginning the affair of Bavaria, she proved that the condescension 
of France had alone encouraged Prussia. Maurepas, surprised 
at a vigour and decision which he was not accustomed to meet, 
lost himself in excuses and in protestations of devotion. 

Maria Theresa, however, made a new effort. Resolute to bear 
everything, even to the degradation of her name, in order, as she 
said, " to dissipate the dangers which threaten the empire and 
Europe," and without informing her son, but taking upon her old 
gray head all the charge and all the blame, she sent Thugut to 
Frederick, on July 1 3, to treat for a peace ; she offered to renounce 
all pretension to Bavaria, if Prussia on its side would give up the 
succession to the margravates of Bayreuth and of Anspach. But 
even these efforts, which cost her so much, were futile ; Joseph 
II. disavowed them angrily, and Frederick repelled them disdain- 
fully. At the end of a month the negotiations were broken off; 
war continued and was unfavourable to Austria ; Marshal Loudon 
was forced to retreat before Prince Henry. Maria Theresa turned 
again to France : — 

" Save your house and your brothers," she wrote to Marie Antoinette. 
" I shall never ask the king to involve himself in this unfortunate war, but 
only to make some protestations, — to name and assemble some regiments 
and generals to come to our succour. It is not becoming to France that 
we should be subjected to our cruel enemy. She will never find a friend 
or an ally at bottom more sincerely attached than we." 

On receiving this letter, Marie Antoinette, whom the absence 
of all news during fifteen days had plunged into the most painful 
uneasiness, sought the king at the moment when he was having 
a conference with Maurepas and Vergennes, and demanded of 
him — what? An armed intervention? No; simply the media- 
tion of France to re-establish peace, and to put a stop to this 
effusion of blood. The request, one must acknowledge, was 



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224 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

modest ; the ministers made no objection to it. The idea of a 
mediation which did not compromise France was compatible 
with the poh'cy which they had followed since the beginning of 
the affair, and their good-will had grown stronger since they had 
learned positively of the rupture of the negotiations. Vergennes 
did not hide the displeasure which the refusal of the king of 
Prussia had given to the cabinet of Versailles. 

But Maria Theresa was impatient ; she was in haste to see the 
ruinous war terminated ; she took up her pen to trace the most 
gloomy and touching picture of the situation, — times were bad; 
snow already covered the mountains; the armies were suffering; 
Maximilian was ill; one might fear everything, so long as these 
unhappy circumstances continued : — 

" Try, my dear daughter, to put an end to them as soon as possible ; 
you will save a mother who has reached the limit of her strength, and two 
brothers who must in the end succumb, your coimtry, a whole nation who 
love you. The honour and even the interest of the king are involved in 
this alliance. . . . We only beg of you to speak firmly everywhere. . . . 
But a great deal of steadfastness and equity of language is necessary, and 
there is no time to lose. . . . What happiness if your confinement takes 
place in a time of peace, which you will have procured for us, and which 
will be so much to the honour of the king, in drawing more closely the 
bonds of our alliance, the only one necessary and fitting for our holy reli- 
gion, for the happiness of Europe, and our houses ! Not only the good 
of the monarchy, but my own preservation depends upon it" 

What could Marie Antoinette do, thus tormented by her 
mother, tormented by Mercy? What could she do in an affair 
where everything was brought to bear to move her, — her politi- 
cal preferences, her religious sentiments, everything, even to that 
maternal love which was aroused in her at the first movement of 
her child, — what could she do, she to whom Goltz himself has done 
the justice to acknowledge that at this juncture she only ceded 
to the repeated solicitations of the court of Vienna? The circum- 
stances were favourable. The hostile armies, which had remained 
opposite each other, but almost inactive, during the whole sum- 
mer, had been forced by the bad weather, which was approach- 
ing, to suspend hostilities ; two Prussian corps had already been 
obliged to retire. This was the time, if ever, to intervene to 
bring about the peace which the empress desired so ardently, 
which the king also wished for, and to which the emperor himself 
was not opposed. Once more Marie Antoinette spoke to her 



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HER APPEALS FOR AUSTRIA LESS PRESSING. 225 

husband of the affair which preoccupied her incessantly. She 
represented to him the necessity of hastening the conclusion of a 
peace, and of an honourable peace ; for Austria could accept no 
other. It was the only means of avoiding an European war, in 
which, in the end, France, nolens volens, was bound to be en- 
gaged. She insisted upon this also to Maurepas, whose fickle- 
ness distressed her; she spoke to him clearly and precisely, but 
with a certain moderation, in order, as she said, ** not to put the 
king into a quandary between his minister and his wife." She 
desired the pacification of Germany; but she desired it- because 
she was convinced that it would conduce to the glory of the king 
and to the welfare of France, not less than to the ** welfare of her 
own dear country." 

But suddenly the intervention of the queen became less ardent, 
her appeals less pressing. She spoke once more to the king, 
but ran over cursorily the points in dispute, and recurred to them 
no more. Maria Theresa complained of being abandoned at the 
most interesting moment for her daughter; namely, at the time 
of her pregnancy. Russia supported Prussia; France did noth- 
ing for Austria. Mercy insisted on his side ; he represented to 
his royal pupil that she should keep herself free from all reproach 
in her own eyes, and in the eyes of her family, of having put off 
or neglected the least thing that could remedy the present ill. 
The ambassador became urgent, almost cross. It was less a 
counsel which he gave her than a reprimand which he addressed 
to her. 

What, then, had happened? Had the queen become less sen- 
sible of her brother's embarrassment and her mother's anguish? 
Assuredly not ; but the time of her confinement was approaching, 
and that event, so long desired, which the court of Vienna hailed 
as the point of departure for an increase of influence, was pre- 
cisely the one that marked the decline of that influence. Marie 
Antoinette felt the imperious duty imposed upon her by the new 
dignity that made her truly queen of France ; and the first thrill 
of maternity bringing with it a thrill of patriotism, she preserved 
toward the king and his ministers an attitude, not of indifference, 
but of reserve. 

The Comte de la Marck relates that the emperor, having de- 
manded from France the assistance of eighty thousand men, as 
had been stipulated in the treaty of 1756, wrote to his sister to 
urge Louis XVI. to grant this reinforcement : — 

VOL. I.— IS 

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226 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

" Before speaking to the king, the queen sent for the Comte de Maure- 
pas and explained to him the interest she took in her brother's request, 
and her desire that he should dispose the king favourably toward it. 

" At this time the queen was pregnant for the first time after many years 
of waiting. Monsieur de Maurepas adroitly seized upon this circumstance, 
and after laying before the queen the reasons why France should not take 
part in a war which was opposed to her interests, and even perhaps to 
justice, added * that the interests of France should, if possible, be dearer 
than ever to the queen, under the happy circumstances that promised to 
give an heir to the throne.* 

** The queen replied to Monsieur de Maurepas that he did justice to 
her sentiments for France, and that after the conversation she had just 
had with him, she would not interfere in the affair nor even speak of it to 
the king. She kept her word." 

There is some inexactness of detail in this account of De la 
Marck; the incident must have taken place somewhat later than 
he places it ; nor can we discover that the queen ever demanded 
an armed intervention. But the fact itself is true, though it has 
been called in question, and we find it confirmed, and in almost 
the same language, in the official correspondence of a man who 
was no friend to Marie Antoinette, but who was almost as well 
informed as to her acts and movements as Mercy himself ; for if 
Mercy was enlightened by his devotion, the former was by his 
distrust and hate, — we speak of the Prussian minister to Paris, the 
Count von Goltz. On sending his master an account of a con- 
versation he had had with the prime minister of France, the Count 
von Goltz wrote : — 

" He, Maurepas, wished to do this justice to the princess, the queen, 
that she listened to reason ; that he had found this to be the case particu- 
larly in the affair of Bavaria ; that then he, the minister, had said to her 
that the child she was bearing did not cease to cry to her that she was 
queen of France before everything ; that he had added that, being on the 
verge of the grave, he would not be able to serve her offspring in the time 
to come, and that, therefore, he would render it the most essential service ^ 
in pleading its cause before the queen-mother ; that this princess, much 
moved, had thanked him for thus reminding her of her true duty, and that, 
in fact, during the whole course of the affair, the queen had not again 
appeared." 

After this testimony, coming from a person whom we cannot 
suspect of partiality, it seems to us impossible to doubt the fact. 
Despite the vivacity of her first appeals, toward what end was 



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FRENCH MEDIATION FOR AUSTRIA. 22/ 

Marie Antoinette's interposition in this affair in reality directed? 
Toward the maintenance of the Franco-Austrian alliance and a 
mediation to secure an honourable peace. On the first point 
there was undoubtedly a great divergence of opinion among 
certain old diplomats, who were faithful to old and obsolete tra- 
ditions, and among certain young innovators who were fanatical 
partisans of Frederick II. ; but on the whole, the king and even 
his ministers thought as the queen did, and in face of the pro- 
digious and already menacing development of Prussia, it was the 
only policy to follow. It could not be good for France to favour 
the indefinite growth of that new power, — her prot6g6 of yester- 
day, her rival of to-morrow ; and a diplomat who indeed belonged 
to the old school and nourished deep-rooted prejudices against 
Marie Antoinette, the Marquis de Bombelles, wrote to the Baron 
de Breteuil, "We cannot, as formerly, return systematically to * 
our alliance with the king of Prussia. This prince and his suc- 
cessors will be too powerful to exhibit that spirit of deference 
which it is fitting for us to find." After a century have Ve not 
too good cause to appreciate the correctness of these previsions 
of the Marquis de Bombelles? 

Who to-day can reproach Choiseul for having founded the alli- 
ance of France and Austria, or Marie Antoinette for having wished 
to maintain it? 

As for our mediation, Bombelles saw therein a means of re- 
establishing our influence in Germany, and of showing the king 
of Prussia what a word from us could do toward maintaining the 
balance in Europe. The emperor alone did not desire it ; but it 
was necessary ** to recall that prince to moderation, who had de- • 
parted from it against the wishes of his august mother and of all 
the sensible persons of his empire." And, in fact, Joseph II. 
showed himself displeased with the attitude of France, and par- 
ticularly of his sister, at this juncture. " The political conduct of 
the king on this occasion," he said to the Comte de la Marck, 
•* is very far removed from that which I should have expected 
from a court which was allied to us and pretended to be friendly." 

The negotiations were long. If Maria Theresa desired peace 
ardently and with a sort of feverish impatience, Joseph II., whose 
pride would be humiliated by a peace, sought it reluctantly; and 
Prussia, feeling herself the stronger, being secretly aided by 
Russia and openly by Saxony and Hanover, adjourned any 
agreement. Finally, after many disagreeable negotiations, a con- 

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228 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

gress assembled at Teschen; and on May 13, 1779, without any 
intervention on the part of the queen, — for Mercy did not even 
acquaint her with the fact, — the peace was signed, to the lively 
disgust of the emperor, who was forced thereby to renounce 
almost the whole of his claim to Bavaria ; to the great relief, how- 
ever, of the empress, who expressed her deep gratitude to the 
king and queen, and growing more just after the cessation of her 
anxiety, acknowledged that France had done all that could have 
been expected of her to bring about this peace. 



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CHAPTER XVII. 

The First Pregnancy of the Queen; her Happiness; her Plans 
FOR THE Education of her Child. — The King's Joy. — Va- 
rious Sentiments of the Royal Family and of the Court. — 
Malicious Remarks. — Dramatic Confinement of the Queen. 

— The Birth of Madame Royale. — Joy of the Public mingled 
with Disappointment. — The Queen's Words to her Daughter. 

— Te Deum in Notre Dame. — An Improvement in the Con- 
duct OF THE Queen, despite Certain Inevitable Relapses. — 
Intimacy of Husband and Wife. — Marie Antoinette's Affec- 
tion FOR Madame Elisabeth. — Impatience of Maria Theresa 
AND THE French People to have a Dauphin. — Miscarriage of 
THE Queen. — Death of Maria Theresa. — Grief of Marie An- 
toinette. — Second Visit of Joseph II. to France. — Birth of 
THE Dauphin. -— Universal Rejoicing, 

" TN the last months of 1777," Madame Campan relates, "the 
•*• queen being alone in her room, had us called, my father- 
in-law and me, and presenting her hand to us to kiss, said 
that as she looked upon us as persons concerned for her happi- 
ness, she wished to receive our compliments; that at last she 
was queen of France, and soon hoped to have children ; that she 
had been able until then to hide her grief, but that in secret 
she had shed many tears." 

These hopes, however, were again deferred ; but at the end of 
some months they were once more renewed, and this time it was 
not to Madame Campan, but to her mother, that the queen con- 
fided them. 

*' Madame, my dear mother," she wrote to her on April 19, 1778, " my 
first impulse — and I am sorry now that I did not follow it eight days 
ago — was to write of my hopes to my dear mamma. I was deterred by 
my fear of occasioning too great grief, if my great hopes came to nothing ; 
they are not yet absolutely sure, and I cannot be entirely certain before 
the first of next month. ... In the mean while I think I have good rea- 
sons to be confident ; furthermore, I am marvellously well ; my appetite 
and my sleep have improved." 



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230 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

It is easy to understand how the first thrill of joy at these 
hopes made the queen's heart beat. She had so often envied 
the fecundity of the Comtesse d'Artois. She realized so well 
that so long as she was not a mother she would always in a 
way be considered a foreigner. What precautions were taken in 
order that this dream might not vanish ! She gave up her rides, 
her excursions to Paris, even billiards ; she only went for a walk, 
and afterward remained seated in her boudoir, busy with some 
needle-work. When the spring came, she installed herself at 
Marly, where the walks were more beautiful and more con- 
venient, where she went out immediately on rising, and where 
the fresh air of the morning and moderate exercise brightened 
her spirits and fortified her body. If now and then she drove, 
it was only with the express permission of the accoucheur whom 
she had chosen, — Vermond, a brother of the abb6. No more 
late hours, no more gambling. Her life became more serious, 
her will more firm, her mind more thoughtful. Her thoughts 
were entirely absorbed by the child she was bearing. She 
followed, step by step, the various evolutions of a condition 
whose novelty delighted her, and whose every advance she 
hailed with delight ; she was sufficiently interested to measure 
her waist, in order to confirm its enlargement. 

She occupied herself in thinking of the care with which she 
should surround the little being who was at that moment the 
object of her tenderness ; she plunged with delight into all the 
sweet and smiling details of maternity. The child should not be 
swaddled ; it should be brought up in liberty, in a carriage, or 
in the arms; it should be lodged on the ground floor, which 
was only separated by a little grille from the terrace of the 
chateau, on which it could take its first steps more easily than 
on the parquet. If it were a dauphin, — and it must be, for all 
the world foretold it, — no governor should be appointed before 
the age of five ; this would be a means of avoiding intrigue, and 
of making a more mature choice. 

In order publicly to announce her happiness, and to inaugu- 
rate it by an act of charity, she sent twelve thousand livres to 
Paris and four thousand to Versailles, for the deliverance of poor 
people detained in prison for debts to nurses. A cry of popular 
gratitude should reply to the joyful cry of the parents, and those 
children who regained their fathers should bless that mother 
who was at last to embrace her child. 



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VARIOUS SENTIMENTS OF THE ROYAL FAMILY. 23 1 

The king was enchanted ; he was all expansiveness and pride 
in his new dignity ; he surrounded her who promised him this 
great happiness, which had so long been desired in vain, with 
delicate attentions, and an affection which was at last enthusi- 
astic; he announced the news officially to the empress. Every- 
thing went well, and despite the alarm which the war of Bavaria 
caused the queen, the danger of her brothers, and the anguish 
of her mother, she bore the fatigues of her pregnancy marvel- 
lously well. ** My health is always excellent," she wrote on 
August 14. " My child made its first movement on Wednes- 
day, July 31, at half-past ten in the evening; since then it often 
moves, which gives me much joy. I cannot tell my dear mamma 
how each movement adds to my happiness." On the following 
day she sought her husband. ** I come. Sire," she said to him 
gayly, ** to complain of one of your subjects, who has had the 
audacity to kick me." The king laughed his big, hearty laugh, 
and tenderly embraced his wife.- 

But all the world did not laugh. If Mesdames, the aunts, 
seemed openly to share the happiness of their nephew, and to 
draw near again for an instant to their niece, which reconciliation, * 
however, did not last ; if the Comte d'Artois, solely occupied 
with his pleasures, seemed quite undisturbed by the new situa- 
tion, — the two Piedmontese sisters, Madame and the Comtesse 
d'Artois, while preserving outwardly the most decorous attitude, 
none the less made in private painful and disagreeable reflec- 
tions; Monsieur preserved his ordinary manner, but he wrote to 
Gustavus III. : — 

" You have heard of the change in my fortune. . . . Externally I re- 
gained mastery over myself very quickly, and preser\*ed the same manner 
as before, exhibiting no joy, — which would have passed for hypocrisy, and 
would have been ; for you can readily believe that I have not experienced 
any, — nor disappointment, which might have been attributed to feeble- 
ness of soul. My private thoughts were more difficult to conquer ; they 
still rebel now and then." 

And the ministers, — particularly Maurepas, — who saw in 
the pregnancy of the queen, in her more serious life, in the 
tender affection which the king showed her, the assurance 
of an influence which threatened them, and which they had 
sought to stifle in dissipation, were equally discomfited, to- 
gether with the courtiers, who had not been invited to Marly, 
whither the queen went in search of rest and solitude ; and all 



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232 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

those envious of Madame de Polignac, whose favour was greater 
than ever, to the degree that Louis XVI. had sent for her 
hastily to come to the court to console her royal friend, when 
disturbed by the despairing and urgent letters of Maria Theresa ; 
and the vindictive Comtesse de Marsan, still sore against Marie 
Antoinette, whom she could not pardon for her lack of sympa- 
thy for the Rohans, and her liking for Choiseul, — Madame de 
Marsan, who was too well seconded in her machinations against 
the queen by the confidential man of her nephew, the Ahh6 
Georgel, an intriguing and dangerous subaltern, whose conver- 
sation made the good monarch so indignant that he wished to 
drive him from Versailles. 

All these malcontents joined together to undermine the queen's 
power at the very moment that it seemed to be growing more 
secure, and to ruin her, if not with the king, who was then in the 
first freshness of his new enthusiasm, at least with the public, 
who had grown more distrustful under the existing circum- 
stances, owing to the tempestuous ambition of Joseph II., which 
had reawakened all the old prejudices against the House of 
Austria. 

Odious couplets, infamous remarks, invented by spite and 
propagated by envy, circulated in Versailles and Paris ; and only 
a few days before the confinement of Marie Antoinette, a whole 
volume of songs against her and some of the principal ladies of 
the court was thrown into a window. Louis XVL, indignant, 
wished to discover the author ; he was discovered ; he was not 
even disturbed. 

The nearer her confinement approached, the greater became 
the anxiety; prayers were offered in all the churches; at the 
court a thousand intrigues were started, which had for their 
object the approaching birth of the royal child. Every one was 
on the alert. More than a hundred persons of quality, who 
usually lived in Paris, installed themselves at Versailles, in order 
the sooner to know the issue of the great event, and to be ready 
to profit by it. The city overflowed with people; no. more 
lodgings were to be had, and the price of living was trebled. 

On December, the i8th, the queen went to bed at eleven 
o'clock, without feeling any pain. At half-past one some one 
rang hastily; labour had begun. Madame de Lamballe and 
the Honouraries, who had been warned, entered- the chamber. 
At three o'clock, Madame de Chimay went to the king; half an 



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DRAMATIC CONFINEMENT OF THE QUEEN. 233 

hour later the princes and princesses who were at Versailles 
were ushered in, while pages galloped to warn those who were at 
Paris or St. Cloud. The royal family, the princes and prin- 
cesses of the blood, the Honouraries, and Madame de Polignac 
were in the chamber of the queen, about the bed, which stood 
opposite the mantel. The household of the king, that of the 
queen, those who had entrance to court, were in the smaller 
rooms adjoining ; the remainder of the assistants in the card- 
room and the gallery. A bizarre custom required that the 
confinement of the queens of France should be public ; it was 
observed, even to its abuse. At the moment when Vermond 
cried, ** The queen is about to be delivered ! " such a wave of 
people surged into the royal bedchamber that in an instant the 
apartment was full ; it was impossible to move ; one would have 
thought it was a public place on the day of a festival; two 
Savoyards even mounted upon a piece of furniture in order to 
see more easily. 

At half-past eleven the child came into the world. It was a 
girl. It was immediately carried into the dressing-room to be 
swaddled, and handed over to the governess, the Princesse de 
Gu^m6n^e. The king, joyous and moved, followed the bearer 
to rejoice in the sight of his first-born ; and almost the entire 
crowd hastened after the king and the child. 

Suddenly an anxious and urgent cry resounded, **Air! hot 
water ! " Blood-letting was necessary. The warmth, the noise, 
the lack of air, the constraint which the queen had imposed upon 
herself to hide her suffering, the shock she had received at first 
when the child did not cry, the joy which agitated her when the 
child began to cry, — so many contrary emotions had brought 
on a threatening relapse. The blood flew to her head violently ; 
her mouth was contorted; the queen lost consciousness. An 
indefinable shudder ran through the crowd ; the Princesse de Lam- 
balle fainted. Some one flew to a window and hastily opened it. 
The hussars drove away the curious and indiscreet persons who 
remained in the chamber; but the hot water did not arrive. 
With rare presence of mind, Vermond ordered the first physi- 
cian to bleed her. The queen opened her eyes ; she was saved ! 
All this had happened so rapidly that the king did not even 
witness the incident. But during these few moments what anguish 
the spectators had endured ! If the queen had been bled t^vo 
minutes later, she would have been dead. Consequently what an 



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234 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE, 

explosion of joy when the danger was past! They congratu- 
lated one another, embraced one another, and cried for joy. 
On that very day, while the Marquis de Beon, lieutenant of the 
guards, went to inform the corps de ville of Paris, which had 
been assembled since the morning, of the birth, and while extra 
couriers set out for Vienna and Madrid, the child was baptized 
in the chapel of the chiteau, in the presence of the king, by 
the Cardinal de Rohan, grand almoner, and received the names 
of Marie Thir^se Charlotte. Monsieur was proxy for the king 
of Spain as godfather. Madame represented the empress as 
godmother. All the royal family were present at the ceremony. 
A solemn Te Deum was chanted in the chapel, and in the even- 
ing a magnificent display of fireworks was set off on the Place 
d'Armes. The court, the city of Paris, and Versailles, — all France 
was wild with joy. In the capital, the two chief aldermen went 
to the prisons and released all those who were detained for debts 
to nurses. A bonfire was lighted on the square of the H6tel de 
Ville, and the principal houses of the city were illuminated. 
But a sufficiently lively disappointment mingled with these trans- 
ports. The royal child had regular and charming features, large 
eyes, a pretty mouth, a complexion that promised perfect health ; 
but it was only a girl, and they had counted upon a dauphin. 
** Poor little one," the queen had said to her daughter when she 
pressed it to her heart for the first time, ** you are not desired ; 
but you will be none the less dear to me. A son would have 
belonged more particularly to the State; you will belong to me. 
You shall have all my care ; you shall share my happiness, and 
lighten my griefs." 

The king gave himself up to his delight without any regrets ; 
he was full of pride in his new dignity. He could not show suffi- 
cient affection to his wife. He even gave up his walk and the 
exercise which was necessary to him in order not to be away 
from her. In the morning he was the first at her bedside. He 
passed a part of the morning there, returned thither in the after- 
noon, and remained all the evening. As for his daughter, he was 
never tired of looking at her. He went every instant to gaze 
upon her, and one day when the child squeezed his finger he was 
indescribably delighted. This rough nature began to open and 
develop ; this heart, so long cold and closed, began to warm 
and expand under the revivifying influence of paternity. 

On the 26th, the queen received for the first time her former 



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THE QUEEN'S RECOVERY. 235 

lady of honour, the Mar6chale de Mouchy, and her former lady 
of the bedchamber, the Duchesse de Coss6. On the 27th, the 
ladies of the palace came in their turn ; on the 28th, those who 
had entrance to the court. On the 31st, the august invalid sat 
up in her chaise tongue. On January 18, she celebrated her 
recovery in the sacristy of the chapel of Versailles, and resumed 
her court duties in their usual form. On February 8, accom- 
panied by the king, Monsieur, Madame, and the Comte and 
Comtesse d'Artois, she went to Paris to render thanks to God 
for her happy deliverance. She was desirous of inaugurating 
her niaternity, as she had done the beginning of her pregnancy, 
by a good deed. At Versailles, six thousand francs were given 
to each of the cur^s of the village, twelve thousand livres spent 
in private charities. At Paris a hundred young couples were 
married by the archbishop on the day o( the queen's entrance, 
habited and dowered at her expense. Each of them received 
five hundred livres' dowry, two hundred for the trousseau, twelve 
for the wedding, together with the promise of fifteen francs a 
month for the first child, if the mother nursed it herself, and ten 
if she confided it to a strange nurse. When the royal cortege 
appeared in the cathedral, these hundred young men and women, 
whom the lieutenant of police, Lenoir, had been ordered to 
choose from among the best-looking, were ranged in the 
church to salute the queen as she passed. Prisoners for debts 
were released ; considerable sums were confided to the cur^s of 
the different parishes. In the evening there were bonfires, fire- 
works, illuminations, fountains of wine, distribution of bread and 
sausages, free representations at the Com^die Fran^aise, where 
the coal-men occupied the box of the king, and the fish-women 
that of the queen. But bread was dear; the war had imposed 
heavy charges; the acclamations were less numerous and less 
noisy than had been hoped for. 

The queen, however, took care on that day to abstain from all 
profane amusement ; she wished to prove that her presence in 
the capital was only determined by pious motives, and in no way 
by a desire for those diversions which she had so often come 
there in search of. After the service at Notre Dame and the one 
at Ste. Genevieve, she went to sup at La Muette, then returned 
to Versailles. She gave herself up more to serious reflections, 
and renounced in part her noisy amusements, as though she felt 
that maternity imposed new duties upon her. The carnival was 



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236 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

more moderate. Lent was quiet; gambling was rare; her con- 
descension toward the favourites less ready. 

The pretensions of the Comte d*Adh^mar met with invincible 
resistance; the companions of the queen were constrained to 
observe more order and decorum ; harmony was carefully culti- 
vated in the royal family; Monsieur and Madame were treated 
with more consideration ; the Comte d' Artois with more coldness. 
The queen had repented on the score of her petulant brother-in- 
in-law, and refused to share in his rancour against Necker. 

Not that there were not still imprudences. Marie Antoinette, 
recovering from the scarlet fever, withdrew to Trianon, with four 
lords who were among her intimate friends, — the Due de Coigny, 
the Due de Guines, Comte Esterhazy, and the Baron de Besenval. 
The king had given his consent; and the constant presence of 
Madame, of the Princesee de Lamballe, and of Madame Elisabeth 
somewhat diminished the evil effects of this preference. None 
the less the court gossiped ; evil tongues baptized the four privi- 
leged men, the four nurses of the queen, and amused themselves 
with picking out the four ladies who should in their turn be the 
king's nurses. There was also that adventure of the cab, which 
we have related above, in reducing it to its true proportions, and 
the resumption of her rides, which alarmed the chief physician, 
Lassone; and furthermore, certain noisy entertainments during 
the spring of 1780, and the return to games of chance, from 
which it was more difficult to wean the queen than from all 
other diversions. 

But despite these inevitable relapses, her progress was evident. 
'* If I have ever fallen into error," she wrote herself, " it was from 
childishness and levity ; but now my head is much better bal- 
anced." Mercy, that pitiless critic, affirmed that her sojourn at 
Trianon in the spring of 1779 was passed quietly. The sojourn 
at Marly which followed was not less satisfactory, and was re- 
peated in 1780 to the universal content of those who were ad- 
mitted to the court there. The decorum was perfect; the order 
excellent. The other journeys did not take place; Compi^gne 
was given up from economy, and Fontainebleau for the prompter 
expedition of affairs. The evening walks had ceased soon after 
the rides. Gambling had diminished; the queen had not dis- 
sembled her displeasure at some heavy losses at the house of 
Madame de Lamballe, and she herself averred that she played 
rather from condescension than from taste. 



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HER FRIENDSHIPS. 237 

She suppressed the theatre at Choisy for fear of the expense, 
and lent herself with the best grace to the reforms which the 
minister of finance instituted in her household. The king having 
wished to double her allowance, she would not accept but the 
half during the war; and Maria Theresa, although always so 
severe on her daughter, wrote to her on June 30, 1780, that the 
charming queen of France contributed more than a little to the 
only happy moments of her painful life. 

Louis XVI., who had been obliged to separate himself from his 
wife during the scarlet fever and her convalescence, — Louis XVI., 
after a momentary coldness caused by malevolent insinuations, 
had returned to his sentiments of devoted tenderness. In vain 
some miserable persons, profiting by the illness of the queen, had 
tried to tempt him to gallantry. His pure and loyal nature re- 
volted against these despicable efforts, and the intimacy between 
husband and wife had only been strengthened by them. There 
seemed on both their parts to be but a rivalry of attentions and 
mutual affability. The queen accompanied her husband to St. 
Hubert; the king accompanied his wife to Trianon, and went to 
pass the evening with her at the house of Madame de Polignac. 

The countess was always the one among the friends of Marie 
Antoinette whose favour was the most durable. The queen could 
judge severely, and generally with correctness, of the other per- 
sons of her set ; concerning her she would hear nothing. She 
passed hours and whole days in her company. Madame de 
Polignac's influence, which seemed for an instant, if not shaken, 
at least shared by the Princess Charlotte of Lorraine, daughter 
of the Comtesse de Brionne, continued steadfast, braving all 
criticism, and defying all attacks. 

Another friendship, less lively than this one, but more profound, 
perhaps, was begun at this time, which, after some momentary 
eclipses due to the perfidious insinuations of the old aunts, was 
to be revived in the hour of adversity, — that for the sister of 
Louis XVI., the amiable and pious Madame Elisabeth. On the 
departure of Madame Clotilde the young princess had exhibited 
a sensibility which had touched Marie Antoinette. " She was a 
charming child," she said, "who had intelligence, character, and 
much grace." The child had grown up ; she was an agreeable 
young girl, full of enthusiasm and gayety. The queen had taken 
her with her to Trianon; she had been delighted with her, and 
on her return said to every one that ** there was no one more 



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238 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

amiable than her little sister-in-law ; that she did not know her 
very well as yet, but that she had made a friend of her, and that 
it would be for life." She kept her word, and after that epoch 
Madame Elisabeth always accompanied her in the journeys to 
Trianon. But the person who had the greatest attraction for the 
queen was her daughter. She rejoiced in the child with all the 
ardour and vivacity of a first attachment. She went to see her 
every hour of the day, supervised the care bestowed upon her, 
following with an attentive eye her physical development, de- 
lighted to see her grow, smiling at her first steps and words, 
pleased that she first stammered ** papa," — for she said it would 
be a bond the more for the king, — still more pleased, perhaps, 
when the child, who was beginning to walk, ran to her holding out 
its arms, and never tired of talking of her daughter in her letters 
to the empress ; and a little later, when the process of teething had 
brought on an attack of fever, remaining at her bedside for whole 
hours, and only consenting to join in the amusements of the court 
on the positive assurance of the physician, and the formal desire 
of the king; a mother in the full acceptation of the term, with a 
mother's tenderness, alarms, little happinesses, and previsions. 
The education of her daughter was the constant object of her 
thought. This woman who every one thought was only occupied 
with amusements and frivolities, had meditated upon the infi- 
nite difficulty and delicacy of the education of children of royal 
race. 

If inexorable tradition did not allow her to change the governess, 
who seemed ill fitted for her high position, the queen at least 
promised herself to supplement the insufficiency of that governess, 
and from the start traced a plan which Mercy described " as very 
wise and well considered." She was determined before all that 
no idea of grandeur should prematurely spring up in the mind of 
the child. Without absolutely dispensing with all etiquette, she 
was resolved to banish all hurtful leniency, all useless affluence of 
serving-people, every appearance likely to give rise to sentiments 
of pride. Marie Antoinette was faithful to this plan, and under 
the eyes of her father and mother Marie Th^r^se Charlotte grew up 
in the practice of strong and Christian virtue. 

But a dauphin was necessary. ** We hope that the queen may 
conduct herself better next year," a lady had written on the day 
following the birth of Madame Royale. Poets dwelt upon the 
subject. The Comtesse Fannie de Beauharnais, who, it seems, had 

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DESIRE FOR A DAUPHIN. 239 

predicted to the young sovereign the birth of a son, repaired her 
error in these couplets : — 

" Yes ; as blundering sibyl for mercy I sue. 
But if my prediction has failed to come true, 
I am fain to admit in turning the book, 
For leaflet the second the first I mistook." 

And the poet Imbert, taking up the same thought, composed 
the following four lines, which ran over Paris : — 

** To thee, O France ! a dauphin shall be born. 
As harbinger a princess doth appear : 
For when you see a Grace to earth return, 
You may be sure that Cupid too is near." 

These hopes were again disappointed. 

Some months after the birth of Madame, the queen became 
pregnant ; but on raising the window of her carriage, she strained 
herself, and a week after had a miscarriage. She was greatly 
grieved at it, and wept bitterly; the king passed the whole 
morning by her bed, exhibiting the most touching affection, 
taking her in his arms, and mingling his tears with hers. 

Maria Theresa was not less distressed than Marie Antoinette ; 
she was impatient to have a grandson. As mother, she ardently 
desired an event which would have crowned the happiness of 
her daughter; as politician, she felt that the birth of a dauphin, 
in giving satisfaction to the country and fulfilling the wishes of 
the king, would definitely assure the power of the queen. She 
returned to the subject constantly, in her letters either to Mercy 
or to Marie Antoinette, even to the point of importunity. It 
was the subject of her reiterated recommendations. It was her 
first wish for a Happy New Year; it was almost a fixed idea. 
The empress came to lecture the queen, and in a way to hold 
her responsible for the adjournment of her hopes. **We must 
have a dauphin," she repeated incessantly, with that insistence 
and haste to enjoy which old people display who feel their lives 
passing away. 

** Impatience consumes me ; my age does not allow me to wait 
Until now I have been discreet; but I shall become impor- 
tunate in the end; it would be a murder not to give more 
children to that race." And a month later, tired of being dis- 
appointed in her desires, she wrote again, ** No appearance of 
pregnancy ; I am in despair ; we must have a dauphin. ... In 
order to insure your happiness and that of France, it must be." 



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240 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

It was to be ; but Maria Theresa was not to see it. Her health, 
undermined by so many fatigues, so many maternal and political 
anxieties, so many cares of all kinds, failed visibly. For a long 
time she had suffered from catarrh ; it seemed as though an in- 
ternal fire consumed her. On Nov. 24, 1780, she fell quite ill. 
Violent attacks of coughing, and continual suffocation, forced 
her to leave her bed. The physician who was called did not 
deceive her; he urged the empress to receive the last sacra- 
ments. On the instances of the emperor, extreme unction was 
deferred; but on the 2Sth the invalid confessed; on the 26th 
the nuncio brought her the viaticum. Maria Theresa received 
it kneeling upon her prie-Dieu, her head covered with a mourn- 
ing veil, as on Ash Wednesday. This woman, who was truly 
strong, did not wish that death should find her in bed. On the 
28th, after extreme unction had been administered, she remained 
alone with the emperor, gave him her benediction for his absent 
brothers and sisters, wrote much, discussed various questions, 
gave orders for her burial, thinking of everything during those 
last hours, — of her children, of her subjects, of her affairs, 
arranging them even to the least details, giving Joseph II. ad- 
vice on the administration of his vast empire, talking to Maxi- 
milian of his future, to the Archduchess Marianne of her 
vocation, preserving to the end the clearness of her mind and 
the vigour of her character. And following with a calm eye 
and tranquil heart the progress of death as it approached, ** I 
have always desired to die thus," she said, ** but I was afraid that 
it might not be granted to me. I see now that everything is 
possible with the grace of God." She passed a frightful night, 
suffering from terrible attacks of suffocation, when they ex- 
pected to see her die at any moment. After one of these 
crises she seemed sleepy, but fought against it. Her children 
urged her to yield. ** How can you wish me to sleep," she said, 
**when at any instant I may be called before my Judge? I am 
afraid to go to sleep ; I do not wish to be surprised ; I wish to 
see the advent of death." When she felt her last hour approach, 
she sent away her daughters, not wishing to have them see her 
die. Then suddenly she rose from her armchair, took a few 
steps toward her chaise longucy and fell ; they stretched her out 
upon it as comfortably as possible. The emperor said to her, 
** You are worse." ..." Bad enough to die," she replied. Then 
addressing her physician, ** Light the mortuary candle," she 



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DEATH OF MARIA THERESA. 241 

said, " and close my eyes ; for that would be too much to ask of 
the emperor." Joseph IL, Maximilian, the Prince Albert of 
Saxony, knelt around her. All was over. . 

Thus died on Nov. 29, 1780, at the age of sixty-three, in the 
full plenitude of her faculties, a great sovereign and a good 
Christian, — Maria Theresa of Austria, empress of Germany, 
and last heir of the Hapsburgs. 

It is related that in the last benediction which she gave to all 
her children, present and absent, when she pronounced the name 
of Marie Antoinette her voice softened and her eyes filled with 
tears. Had she in that last hour a sudden intuition of the bloody 
future awiaiting that princess who was then so envied? Or on 
reviewing rapidly the ten years that had passed since the day 
when the archduchess left Vienna, gracious and smiling at life, 
and contemplating, with that clear view which approaching death 
gives to all, the harm which successive influences — her own at 
times too readily accepted — had done to that young woman, 
did she understand the dangers which were about to assail her, 
did she seek to dissipate these dangers in the last letter, which, 
if we may believe Weber and the Count von Goltz, she dictated 
on the very day of her death to the queen of France? These 
are secrets of the grave ; but it would seem, indeed, that a threat- 
ening cloud had veiled the radiant horizon of eternity from the 
great sovereign. 

There was but one cry at the news of the death of Maria 
Theresa, — a cry of veneration and of praise for the great soul 
that had quitted the earth. At Paris, despite the prejudices 
against the House of Austria, there was a general expression of 
respect and regret. Maria Theresa loved France, and at bottom 
she was admired and loved there. The king, who had only a 
mediocre sympathy for his brother-in-law, felt profound consid- 
eration and filial reverence for his mother-in-law. In Germany 
the emotion was extreme ; Frederick II. himself, the implacable 
adversary of the empress, joined in the universal homage : " I 
shed sincere tears on her death," he wrote to D'Alembert; **she 
was an honour to her sex and to the throne. I have waged war 
against her, but I have never been her enemy." 

The terrible news reached Versailles on Wednesday evening, 

December 6, but Louis XVI. had not the courage himself to 

announce it to Marie Antoinette ; he confided this sad duty to the 

Abb^ de Vermond, and only went to his wife a quarter of an 

VOL. I. — x6 

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242 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

hour after the melancholy messenger. The queen's grief was 
frightful; the violence of the blow even brought on a slight 
hemorrhage, which gave rise to much disquietude. The young 
woman immediately assumed mourning of respect, while waiting 
for the court to put on its official mourning. She withdrew to 
her rooms to give free vent to her tears, and remained shut up 
there during twelve days, only leaving them to go to mass, and 
only admitting the royal family, the Princesse de Lamballe, and 
the Duchesse de Polignac, caring to talk only of her mother, of 
her virtues, of her counsels, and of her example, and giving ex- 
pression to her grief in the following letter, addressed on De- 
cember ID, to Joseph II. : — 

'* Stricken with this awful misfortune, it is only in tears that I can write 
you. Oh, my brother ! oh, my friend ! no one remains to me but you, 
in the country which will always be dear to me. Be careful, take care of 
yourself ; you owe it to us all. There is no one but you to whom I can 
commend my sisters. They have lost even more than I. They will be 
very unhappy ! Adieu, adieu ! I cannot see what 1 write. Remember 
that we are your friends, your allies ; love me. I embrace you." 

This dear brother returned again to France during the summer 
of 1 78 1, but only to make an exceedingly short sojourn, in the 
strictest incognito. The queen was none the less happy to see 
him again. He seemed like the echo of the last words, the ex- 
pression of the last wishes of a mother whom she still mourned. 
When he departed at the end of a few days, on August 5, well 
pleased with his visit, and on finding in the king and queen a 
considerable change for the better, she could not hide her sor- 
row, and the courtiers saw her hide her face under her hat to 
weep. 

Maternity alone could console her for these repeated blows 
of misfortune. God was finally to send her that dauphin so ar- 
dently and so long desired. From the month of April, the preg- 
nancy of the queen had been announced. Her health continued 
excellent during the entire summer, and this time she counted 
with certainty upon a son. ** My health is perfect; I am grow- 
ing very large," she wrote to her friend. Princess Louise of Hesse- 
Darmstadt. ** Your sorcery is very kind to promise me a boy. 
I have great faith in it, and I do not doubt of its coming true." 

It was on October 22 that this happiness was granted her. 
The preceding night had been comfortably passed.' On the 22d, 



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THE BIRTH OF THE DAUPHIN. 243 

on wakening, the queen felt some pain ; she none the less took a 
bath ; but the king, who was to go to shoot at Sacle, counter- 
manded the hunt. Between twelve and half-past, her pain in- 
creased ; at a quarter past one the dauphin was born. In order 
to prevent a repetition of the accident which had occurred at 
the birth of Madame, it had been decided that the crowd should 
not be allowed to invade the royal apartment, and that the 
mother should not know the sex of the child until all danger 
was past. On learning the news at half-past eleven, Madame 
de Polignac had run to the queen ; but the other persons who 
ran there with equal haste — the ladies of the palace in the 
greatest undress, the men as they were — had found the door 
closed. Only Monsieur, the Comte d*Artois,, Mesdames the 
aunts, Mesdames de Lamballe, de Chimay, de Mailly, d'Ossun, 
de Tavannes, and de Gu6m^n^e, were there, passing alternately 
from the bedchamber to the Salon de la Paix. When the child 
was born, it was silently carried to the large dressing-room, where 
the king saw it washed and dressed, and gave it to the governess, 
the Princesse de Gu6m6n^e. 

The queen was in bed, anxious and knowing nothing; all those 
who surrounded her controlled their countenances so well that the 
poor woman, seeing their constrained air, thought that she had 
given birth to a second girl. " You see how reasonable I am," 
she said gently ; ** I do not question you.*' But the king could 
no longer restrain himself. Approaching the bedside of his wife, 
*' Monsieur le Dauphin," he said, with tears in his eyes, — "Mon- 
sieur le Dauphin requests permission to enter." The child was 
brought; the queen embraced it with an enthusiasm that cannot 
be described, then handing it to Madame de Gu6m6n6e, *'Take 
him," she said, — " he belongs to the State ; but I shall have my 
daughter." 

The scene was indescribable : all constraint was thrown aside ; 
joy broke forth freely ; it was so lively and so genuine that it 
even silenced jealousy and hate. An eye-witness wrote : — 

'* The antechamber of the queen was charming to see. The joy was 
overwhelming; all heads were turned. You saw them laughing and 
crying alternately. People who did not know one another, men and 
women, fell upon one another's necks; and even those who wei-e 
least attached to the. queen were carried away by the universal de- 
light. It was the same when, half an hour after the birth, the doors of 
the queen's chamber were thrown open, and Monsieur le Dauphin was 



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244 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

announced. Madame de Gu^m^nde, radiant with joy, held him m her 
arms and traversed the apartments in her chair, to carry him to her own 
apartment. There were acclamations of joy and clapping of hands, which 
penetrated to the queen's chamber and assuredly to her heart. The 
crowd adored and followed him. Arrived at his apartment, the arch- 
bishop wished to decorate him with the cordon bleu ; but the king said 
that he must be made a Christian first." 

Madame heard the news, which was to remove her forever 
from the throne, in an amusing fashion. She was hastening to 
the queen, when she encountered one of those valiant Swiss then 
attached to the fortunes of France, the Count of Stedingk, who 
could not contain his joy: "A dauphin, Madame," he blurted 
out ; " a dauphin, what happiness ! " The princess answered 
nothing; but she had sufficient tact to hide her feelings and to 
manifest, outwardly at least, great satisfaction, being more clever 
than Madame de Balbi, "who showed the temper of a dog." 

Monsieur, like his wife, dissembled his sentiments. Madame 
Elisabeth was so delighted that she could not believe it; she 
laughed, cried, and was almost ill from emotion. The Comte 
d'Artois, alone of the royal family, let fall a word which betrayed 
his disappointment. His son, the young Due d'Angoul^me, 
had gone to see the dauphin. *' Man Dieul papa," he said on 
leaving the chamber, ** how little my cousin is ! '* ** A day will 
come, my son," the prince could not help replying, " when you 
will find him big enough." 

As for the king, he was intoxicated with his happiness ; he did 
not cease to look at his son and to smile at him ; tears ran from 
his eyes; he presented, without distinction, his hand to every 
one; his joy overcame his habitual reserve. Gay and aflfable, he 
sought every occasion to pronounce the words, ** My son, the 
dauphin;" and taking the child in his arms, he held it up at 
the window, with an expression of content which touched every 
one. 

At three o'clock the new-born child was baptized in the chapel 
of Versailles by the Cardinal de Rohan, grand almoner. He was 
held at the font by Monsieur in the name of the emperor, by 
Madame Elisabeth in the name of the princess of Piedmont, 
and named Louis Joseph Xavier Franqois. Afler the ceremony, 
the Comte de Vergennes, chief treasurer of the St. Esprit, 
brought him the cordon bleu; the Marquis de S6gur, minister 
of war, the cross of St. Louis. A Te Deum succeeded the 



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JOY AT THE DAUPHIN'S BIRTH. 245 

baptism, and in the evening there were fireworks on the Place 
d'Armes. 

He was an exceptionally beautiful child, of surprising strength, 
so it was said ; and when one saw him fresh and rosy in his little 
bed, rocked by his nurse, Madame Poitrine, a predestined name, 
— a robust peasant woman from the neighbourhood of Sceaux, 
who swore like a trooper, was surprised at nothing, not even at 
the lace and caps worth six hundred livres with which she was 
decked out, but declared that she would not put on powder be- 
cause she had never used it, — one called down upon that little 
head the fairest wishes for the future. The ladies of the court, 
admitted to look at the royal infant, found him ** as beautiful as 
an angel ; " the courtiers disputed about the choice of the future 
governor ; and one noticed, not without malice, the disappointed 
mien of the Due de Guines, who had once flattered himself that 
he should have that place, and whose recent disgrace had robbed 
him of all hope. When the President of the Court of Accounts 
and the President of the Court of Aid came to pay their com- 
pliments, the latter said to the dauphin, "Your birth is our joy; 
your education will be our hope; your virtue our happiness." 

At Paris the transports were not less lively when Monsieur 
Croismare, lieutenant of the guards, announced the great news 
at the Hdtel de Ville. People laughed and embraced one another 
in the streets. In the evening, at the Com^die Italienne, Madame 
Billioni, who took the part of a fairy, sang the following lines, 
composed by Imbert : — 

" A fay am I, and can relate, 

A new and joyful thing, 
To make each loyal heart dilate : 

A son is born unto our king. 
This dauphin whom we celebrate 

One day o'er France will reign ; 
May that sun's dawning be but late, 

And later set again ! " 

And a poet scarce known to-day, Chabeaussi^re, published the 
following allegory, which suited well the taste of that day, and 
enjoyed a moderate success : — 

" A gard'ner, famed afar for skill and vigilance, 
Disliking fallow land, within a garden close 
One day engrafted on a laurel-tree of France 
An exquisite and fragrant Austrian rose. 



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246 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

His work throve mightily and met with no mischance. 

Enchanted with the sudden change, the tree 

Did the honours to the rose right gallantly. 

Ere long the owner found, from its exuberance, 

He had an Austrian rose — and laurel-tree of France." 

The celebrations were as splendid as ingenious. The arts and 
crafts of Paris spent considerable sums to go in a body to Ver- 
sailles to offer their homage to the queen, and to defile before 
her, with music at their head, in the marble court. The pro- 
cession was charming; it continued during nine days. Each 
corporation bore the insignia of its profession: the chimney- 
sweeps carried a chimney, from the top of which one of their 
smallest members sang, in a clear voice, a song appropriate to 
the occasion; the butchers led a fat cow; the chair porters 
carried a gilt chair, which contained a nurse with a dauphin; 
the locksmiths hammered upon an anvil ; the shoemakers made 
a little pair of shoes for the new-born child ; the tailors a little 
uniform for his regiment. The entire court enjoyed this spec- 
tacle ; the king remained for a long time watching it, and had 
twelve thousand livres distributed among these good people. 

The locksmiths of Versailles did not wish to be behind their 
colleagues of Paris, — they presented a secret lock. Louis XVI.. 
in his quality of artisan, wished to discover the secret himself. 
When he pressed a spring, a little steel dauphin, admirably cut, 
sprang from the middle of the lock. The prince was delighted ; 
he said aloud that the gift of these good people had given him 
great pleasure, and he had thirty livres more distributed among 
them than among the other corporations. 

The women of the halles came in their turn on November 4, 
to congratulate the happy mother ; there were one hundred and 
twenty of them, dressed in gowns of black silk, and the most 
of them covered with diamonds. Three of these women were 
admitted near the bed of the invalid; one of them, who was 
extremely pretty and had a beautiful voice, delivered an address 
which had been composed by La Harpe, and which he had written 
on her fan. ** Madame," she said to the mother, ** it is so long 
that we have loved you without daring to tell you so, that we 
shall have need of all of your indulgence in order not to abuse 
your permission to express it to you now." And then, turning 
to the dauphin, "You cannot yet understand the vows which 
we make about your cradle; they will explain them to you some 



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OFFICIAL CELEBRATIOxNS. 247 

day. They are all expressed in the wish to see in you the image 
of those who have given you life." 

The queen responded with the greatest affability to this dis- 
course, and the delighted king had a sumptuous repast served 
to these women. One heard him humming, with a joyous air, 
lines sung by the women of the holies^ whose lively rhythm and 
popular air had struck him : — 

*' Be not fearful, father dear, 

To see your growing family ; 
God will feed them, never fear, 

Make Versailles swarm with progeny. 
Should hosts of Bourbons France befall, 
There would be bread and laurel wreaths for all." 

On Wednesday, the 26th, the king went in great state to Paris, 
to hear a Te Deum sung in Notre Dame ; the archbishop came 
to congratulate him at the door, and in the evening the illumina- 
tions were superb. 

On the following day, the 27th, the opera, which had been 
recently rebuilt, inaugurated its reopening by a free representa- 
tion, to the cries of **Long live the king!" "Long live the 
queen ! " " Long live the dauphin ! '* During a whole month, 
there was some new celebration each day, religious ceremonies 
of thanksgiving, or amusing spectacles, — a procession of the 
parishes of Paris to Notre Dame, wherein one noticed the cure 
of St. Nicolas, followed by five hundred poor men ; free repre- 
sentations at the theatres; couplets, concerts, etc. Each one 
wished to distinguish himself by his zeal, even to the flower- 
woman of the king, Madame M^dard, who had a Te Deum sung 
at St. Germain TAuxerrois. Charity had its usual place in these 
solemnities. Four hundred and seventy-four thousand livres were 
appropriated to the deliverance of prisoners for debt. 

The great official celebrations, postponed for a time, owing to 
events of the war, then to a grave illness 0/ the Comtesse 
d'Artois, were definitely fixed for Monday, Jan. 21, 1782. On 
that day the queen left La Muette at half-past nine, forsook 
her state coach at the Rond du Cours, and went on foot to 
Notre Dame, then to Ste. Genevieve, to thank God for the happy 
birth of the dauphin. At a quarter past one, she betook herself 
to the H6tel de Ville, where the king joined her, and where the 
princes, the nobles, and ladies of the court in full dress awaited 
her. The architect, Moreau, had covered the court of the hotel, 
and had thus made of it a magnificent gallery; the arcades 

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248 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

formed boxes, decorated with Corinthian columns, and sur- 
mounted by shields bearing the arms of France. The royal box 
occupied the space between the three columns in the centre, 
with its rotunda and cupola decorated with gold vases filled with 
lilies. The top of the box was covered with crimson stuff and 
crowned by a dolphin. When, before dinner, the king and 
queen showed themselves upon the balcony, the whole crowd 
that filled the square and the quay applauded. • 

A sumptuous feast of seventy covers had been prepared. The 
king was served by the provost of merchants. Monsieur de Cau- 
martin ; the queen by the niece of the provost, Madame de la 
Porte. After dinner a drawing-room was held, and play in the 
great hall, whence one returned to the banqueting-hall to see the 
display of fire-works on the new quay. It represented a Temple 
of Hymen, on the threshold of which France received the infant 
who had just been born. The plan was good; the execution but 
mediocre ; the service at the banquet itself left much to be de- 
sired. If we may believe a chronicler, the dukes and peers had 
nothing to eat but butter and radishes. 

At a quarter past seven the king set out for La Muette ; half 
an hour later the queen departed in her turn. Both of them 
traversed the principal streets and squares, which were brilliantly 
illuminated, and in particular the Place Venddme and the Place 
Louis XV. Enthusiastic acclamations greeted them along their 
route, but were always more noisy for the king than for the queen. 
It would seem that some bitterness was always destined to be 
mingled with the purest and most legitimate joys of that princess; 
Louis XVI. was in a bad humour on that day, we do not know 
why, and had refused with unwonted severity the requests which 
she had made to him. He had not consented to receive the flags 
taken at St. Eustache, on his entrance into Notre Dame, before they 
were hung in the basilica. And in the evening, despite the appeals 
of his wife, he had insisted upon returning alone to La Muette, in 
order not to confound the two corti^ges in the same demonstration. 
And what was more serious, a despicable pamphlet, which was 
odiously injurious to the queen, had been affixed that very 
morning to the door of the cathedral, and a great rumour spread 
that a danger threatened her at the H6tel de Ville. In conse- 
quence of this the unfortunate sovereign, who had been im- 
prudently warned of these rumours and threats by the Comte 
d'Artois, passed the whole day in a state of terror which poisoned 
her happiness. 

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THE ENTHUSIASM IN THE COUNTRY. 249 



On the 23d the king and queen returned to Paris to attend a 
ball at the H6tel de Ville, and appeared very gay, despite the 
mob which filled the hall to the point of half suffocating them. 

In the country the enthusiasm was unalloyed ; it was a patriotic 
delirium, a chronicler has said. The States of Bourgogne dow- 
ered twelve young girls; the archbishop of Vienna did the 
same; the Parliament of Rennes distributed six thousand livres 
among the poor; at Soissons, the intendant, Le Pelletier, gave 
a feast to the labourers of his district, and distributed wine to 
three thousand persons. At Limoges they raised a fountain and 
created a Place Dauphine; at Orleans they baptized a street with 
the same name. At Rouen a travelling actor, who was still ob- 
scure, but who was destined to a great and sinister celebrity, Col- 
lot d'Herbois, played on the stage of that city a piece of his own 
composition, and sang the following lines, which, though but a 
mediocre poetical attempt, were at least an ardent profession of 
monarchical faith, and of homage and devotion to that august 
princess whose kindness and virtues had conquered all hearts. 

" That the French might be happy, 
Our good Louis Seize 
Has wedded for aye 
The child of Th^r^se. 
From this happy union 
Has spnmg a brave scion. 
Oh, may gracious Heaven 
Watch over and screen 
From misfortune unbidden. 
The days of our queen ! " 

History pauses with melancholy pleasure over these details, 
which fill all the gazettes and chronicles of the time. It was the 
last glimmer of an order of things on the point of disappearing. 
The eye contemplates with delight that intimate union of a people 
and a dynasty, who mingled their joys, their sorrows, their hopes, 
and who in truth only formed a large family whose father was 
the king. 

** The folly of the people continues ever the same," a lady of the 
court wrote a week after the birth of the dauphin. *' One encoun- 
ters in the street only violins, songs, and dances; I find all this 
touching, and I do not know, in fact, a nation more amiable than 
ours." 



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CHAPTER XVIII. 

War in America. — Franklin's Mission. — War declared. — The 
Queen Favourable to the Americans. — Protectress of La- 
fayette. —Her Anxieties during the War. — She is Desirous 
of an Honourable Peace. — The Peace of 1783; its Con- 
sequences. — Princely Visitors. — The Princesses of Hesse- 
Darmstadt. — The Comte and the Comtesse du Nord. — Enter- 
tainments AT Trianon AND Chantilly. — The King of Sweden. 

— Prince Henry of Prussia. — Birth of the Due de Normandie. 

— Bankruptcy of the Prince de Guemenee. — The Duchesse de 

POLIGNAC made GOVERNESS TO THE CHILDREN OF FRANCE. 

AT this time both dynasty and people were gaining newvigour 
from those revivifying waves of military glory, always so 
dear to our national pride. For three years they had been at war 
with England, and the French standard had regained incontestable 
renown upon the seas. On the 4th of July, 1776, the Congress of 
Philadelphia had proclaimed the independence of the United 
States, and decided to send three delegates over the sea to win 
the sympathy and support of the European powers for America. 
On December 2, Dr. Franklin disembarked at Auray, from the 
vessel which had successfully carried him through the English 
cruisers, and journeying by short stages, arrived on December 21 
at Versailles. 

The choice of an American ambassador was fortunate. An 
apparently good-humoured man, hiding under an appearance of 
simplicity, then in fashion, great cunning; affecting an air of plain 
dealing and independence which charmed by its contrast with the 
solemn formulas of etiquette ; possessing the patience and phlegm 
of the Anglo-Saxon race ; knowing how to wait without impatience, 
but also without ever becoming discouraged or losing sight of the 
end he had in view, — Franklin, both by his virtues and his de- 
fects, pleased the nation, which was easily content with words, be- 
guiled by appearances, fond of strangers, and enthusiastic over 



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FRANKLIN'S MISSION. 25 1 

any innovation. He soon saw that the true sovereign of France 
at that time was neither the king nor the queen nor the ministers, 
but public opinion, and it was this opinion which he determined to 
influence. Everything he did was done for the sake of appearance. 
Free from all constraining prejudices, he went to mass, although 
a Protestant, praised kings, although a Republican, courted both 
his cur6 and Voltaire, — offering the holy bread to the former, 
soliciting the benediction of die latter for his grandson, in a scene 
which Bachaumont has described, ai'd whose charlatanism re- 
volted evv.n that sceptic chronicler. Flattering bishops and free- 
masons, silohs and lodgci, men of letters and men of affairs, 
philosophers and preLty women, who embraced him despite his 
glasses; ignoring the received customs in order to make himself 
conspicuous, appearing at the theatre in a plain brown cloth coat 
and with uncurled hair in the midst of powdered wigs and em- 
broidered coats ; apparently tranquil and inactive, but employing 
many subordinate people, setting everything in action (arts, sci- 
ences, letters) to make himself known and famous, — the " good- 
natured Franklin," as some called him, "the good and venerable 
doctor," as others called him, soon became the idol, or as he him- 
self said, ** the doll," of the Parisians, while at the same time render- 
ing his country and his cause popular. The talk was of nothing 
but America ; every one dreamed of the United States ; hair was 
dressed aux insurgents; one played Boston; every one grew 
enthusiastic over republican ideas, and their representative. 

The young nobles declared for the cause of the rebellious colo- 
nies. The Marquis de Lafayette embarked for America despite 
the opposition of his family, even despite the express prohibition 
of the king. The Vicomte de Noailles, brother-in-law of Lafayette, 
the Comte de S6gur, Comte de Pontgibault, the Comte de Gouvion, 
even the cousins of the Prince de Montbarrey, minister of war, 
departed to enroll themselves under the flag of Washington. It 
was a veritable delirium. 

Joseph IL, during his journey to France, sought in vain to throw 
a little cold water over this enthusiasm. " My profession is to be 
a Royalist," he replied dryly to a lady who was praising the Amer- 
icans, — "those athletes of liberty," as Frederick IL called them. 
But he was impotent to arrest the popular infatuation, which even 
gained the court. There the insurgents found an ardent advo- 
cate in the minister from Prussia, the Count von Goltz, whose 
master was not sorry to embroil France and England, in order to 



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252 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

have a free hand on the side of Dantzick, or, if need were, on the 
side of Bavaria. On the command of his sovereign Goltz ceased 
not to insinuate that France might find therein a favourable occa- 
sion to avenge her defeats, and perhaps to recover her lost colo- 
nies. And in fact the temptation was great. To take brilliant 
revenge for the defeats of the Seven Years' War, and the humili- 
ating treaty of 1763 ; to humble in our turn our eternal rival; to 
inflict a decisive and perhaps irremediable blow on her power ; to 
prove that we had not degenerated from the conquerors of Fonte- 
noy ; and, above all, to show the strength of our marine, which had 
been decimated in the struggle with England, but for whose restora- 
tion they had been energetically working since the accession of 
Louis XVI., — what a fine and alluring prospect ! There was, with- 
out doubt, a financial question which might interfere. Turgot, 
while minister, had actively opposed all intervention in American 
affairs ; he had written a long memoir to show that it was necessary 
to avoid a war as the greatest of misfortunes, since it would render 
impossible for a very long time, and perhaps forever, the reforms 
which were absolutely requisite to the prosperity of the State and 
the relief of the people. Necker, who had succeeded Turgot, 
was not more favourable to so costly an enterprise. But what 
was money compared to glory? Vergennes visibly leaned toward 
an alliance with the United States; Maurepas did not dissem- 
ble his joy at the blows dealt to British pride. Louis XVL still 
hesitated ; profoundly penetrated with the monarchical idea and 
the necessity of the principle of authority, he recoiled from sup- 
porting an insurrection ; a man of peace, he was not anxious to 
throw himself into a war; loyal to his word once given, he felt 
scruples at breaking, without cause, a treaty which had been sol- 
emnly accepted, and which England had not violated. The queen 
had no such hesitation. She shared the general enthusiasm. Her 
ardent nature only saw the chivalrous side of the enterprise, — 
an oppressed people to defend, glory to be won, the prestige of 
France to be restored. She liked not the ambiguous conduct 
of the minister who, while refusing to break with the English, 
furnished in secret, and allowed to be furnished, arms and muni- 
tions to the insurgents. She put all her power and all her influ- 
ence at the service of the partisans of the war, and it was she who 
undertook to conquer the opposition of her husband. She handed 
to the king a memoir by the Comte d'Estaing and the Comte de 
Maillebois, which energetically advocated the war, and attacked 



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NEWS OF THE CAPITULATION OF BURGOYNE. 253 

the conduct of the cabinet as pusillanimous. " The powers of 
Europe," this memoir said, " will judge the reign of Louis XVI. 
according to the manner in which this prince will know how to use 
the present circumstances to humble the pride and pretensions of 
a rival power." 

The capitulation of the English general, Burgoyne, at Sara- 
toga, on Oct. 13, 1777, was an argument the more. This great 
event increased the strength of the colonies, and made the chances 
of their success almost certain. " The chances are a hundred to 
one in favour of France," Frederick II. wrote. 

The joy over this victory for the Americans was great at Paris. 
The king himself could not conceal his satisfaction, and on 
December 6, two days after the news of the captivity of Bur- 
goyne, Monsieur Vergennes informed Franklin and his colleagues 
that the circumstances seemed favourable for the establishment of 
a close alliance between the Crown and the United Provinces of 
North America. Negotiations were actively pushed forward ; 
and on Jan. 21, 1778, at a ball given by the queen, the Comte de 
Provence, who had just left the council, announced that a treaty 
had been concluded with the United States, and that the 
order had been given to put a certain number of vessels into 
commission. ** There was general emotion in the hall," the 
ambassador from England, Lord Stromont, relates, " and much 
whispering among the young nien, all of whom were eager for 
war; many marks of pleasure. The Comte d'Artois exhibited 
transports of joy." 

On February 6 the treaty was finally signed ; and on March 16 
Lord Stromont demanded his passports. They had entered 
upon the struggle. With her taste for war and her thoughtless- 
ness for the future, France threw herself into an adventure in 
which she was to cover herself with glory, but at the same time 
exhaust her finances, and the political consequences of which 
were to be incalculable. She entered upon it with a gayety 
which wounds those who to-day can see the results. *' Louis 
XVI. and Marie Antoinette," the most recent historian of the 
war for independence has said, ** when they embarked for the 
liberation of America. Pleasure on the prow, and the uncertain 
hand of Youth at the helm, might have cried out to the young 
republic which they fostered, ^ Morituri te salutant!^ ['The 
doomed to die salute thee ! '] " 

At the start all went well. From the first day our navy 



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254 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

showed itself equal to the English navy. On June 17 the first 
engagement at sea ended with a brilliant victory for France. 
After a hand-to-hand conflict, the captain of the " Clocheti^re " 
forced Captain Marshall to retreat, and the name of the French 
ship — the "Belle Poule " — immediately became popular. On 
July 27 the fleet of Admiral d'Orvilliers gained a decisive 
advantage over Admiral Keppel, which would have been a 
greater triumph if the Due de Chartres, who commanded one 
of the squadrons, had better comprehended and carried out the 
signals of the admiral. The war was carried on in Europe, in 
America, in the Indies, with varying vicissitudes, but with great 
glory for our arms. On land, Lafayette and Rochambeau were 
the lieutenants and disciples of Washington, and on Oct. 19, 
1 78 1, gloriously forced Cornwallis to capitulate at Yorktown 
with eight thousand men. On the sea, D'Estaing captured the 
" Granada," Bouill6 the " Dominique ; " while Lamott, Picquet, 
De Grasse, Bougainville, and, above all, Suff'ren, sometimes victo- 
rious, sometimes beaten, but always intrepid, maintained the 
honour of the national flag. 

The queen followed, with an anxious eagerness, every move- 
ment jof our navy and of our army. ** They are in the Channel," 
she wrote to her mother on Aug. 16, 1779, when the union of 
the Spanish and French fleets was preparing an invasion into 
England, and aroused hopes in the public which, unfortunately, 
were to be disappointed, — "they are now in the Channel, and 
I cannot think without trembling that at any moment their fate 
may be decided. I am frightened also at the approach of the 
month of September, when the sea is no longer practicable ; it 
is to my dear mamma's bosom that I confide all my disquietude. 
May God grant that it be unfounded ! " The failure of this 
campaign, undertaken at such great expense, the entrance of 
D'Orvilliers into Brest without having done anything, but too 
well justified the forebodings of Marie Antoinette. 

But the queen was not discouraged ; under all circumstances 
she loudly proclaimed her sympathy for America, and her pro- 
tection for Lafayette, who was the promoter of the alliance. 
When, at the beginning of February, 1779, the young general 
returned to France, Louis XVL, in order to punish him for his 
disobedience, commanded him to remain a week at Paris, in the 
house of his father-in-law, without going anywhere. But as soon 
as this arrest was over, Lafayette reappeared at Versailles, where 



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HER INTEREST IN THE WAR. 255 

he was the object of an enthusiastic ovation ; the king himself 
only addressed an affectionate reprimand to him; the queen 
received him with eager curiosity: " Give me news of our good 
Americans, of our dear republicans." On his request, she sent 
a full-length portrait of herself to Washington. She copied with 
her own hand some lines from the play of Gaston and Bayard, 
wherein the public saw an allusion to the hero of the two worlds. 

"... Ah, what youth is this 
In whom we perceive the wisdom of age ? 

I love to tread in his footsteps, copy his mien. 

His prudence I honour, rejoice in his courage : 

Grant a warrior these twain, and what matters his age ? " 

She used all her power to have him given a high command in 
the army corps which was to be sent to the aid of the United 
States. She assured Rochambeau of her good-will ; and when 
the Comte d*Estaing, the happy conqueror of the " Granada," 
was presented to the king, on his return from the brilliant expe- 
dition which had excited in France such extraordinary enthu- 
siasm, she condescended herself to bring him a footstool whereon 
he could rest his wounded leg, — a gracious attention, for which 
she was to be so sadly repaid. 

The solicitude of the queen was incessantly on the alert con- 
cerning affairs in America, concerning the chances of the war, 
above all, the operations of the navy ; and her heart, which has 
been accused of beating only in the interests of Austria, beat 
with incomparable force for all that touched the honour or glory 
of France. 

When, in the month of March, 1780, they were preparing to 
send under the command of Rochambeau a body of troops to 
America, Marie Antoinette was all uneasiness. "We cannot," 
she said, ** risk this large convoy without being sure of the sea; 
it would be frightful to suffer any misfortune from that. I avow 
I cannot think of it calmly." "The troops destined for the 
Islands have embarked, and are only awaiting a favourable wind 
to leave port," she wrote, a month later. *' God grant that they 
may arrive in safety ! " Her thought followed those vessels, 
which were carrying the soldiers and fortunes of France across 
the sea; and as if to crown these patriotic anxieties, it was in the 
apartment of the queen, on Nov. 19, 1781, a few days after the 
birth of the dauphin, that the king learned from the mouth 



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256 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

of the Due de Luzerne the great and good news of the capitu- 
lation of Cornwallis, forced to surrender by the fleet of the 
Comte de Grasse, and the united troops of Washington and 
Rochambeau. 

Public opinion tired sooner than the queen of these efforts of 
France, and of the uncertainties of the war. From the beginning 
of 1779, it was disposed toward peace; this inclination was much 
more decided after the failure of the project of a descent upon 
England. ^Austria and Russia proposed their mediation. ** It 
would be a great good fortune/' Marie Antoinette replied, *' and 
my heart desires it more than anything in the world. But," 
she added proudly, " the failure of this campaign precludes all 
idea of a peace." In the council, Necker, who was ill disposed 
toward America, and concerned for the financial situation, in- 
sisted upon a prompt cessation of hostilities; Maurepas, who 
was always weary of anything which necessitated contention and 
caused embarrassment, — Maurepas made overtures to a former 
secretary of the English embassy to Paris. The king himself 
was tired of the war, and wished that it should be finished before 
the end of the year. Spain on her part sought to make a sepa- 
rate arrangement : the Americans fought but feebly, since Eng- 
land had offered to recognize their independence, and at bottom 
the two allied nations did not love each other. " Our allies," 
the Count von Fersen wrote, ** have not always acted well toward 
us, and the time we have passed with them has taught us neither 
to love nor esteem them." Austria renewed her offers of media- 
tion. The queen desired an agreement no less than the king 
and his ministers ; but she desired that it should be honourable, 
and protested energetically against any humiliating treaty: 
** Peace would be a great boon ; but if our enemies do not de- 
mand it, I should be greatly afflicted if we made one that was 
humiliating." 

This peace, the object of so many prayers, finally came in 
1783; it filled Marie Antoinette with joy ; she never spoke of it but 
with pride and the sentiment of a queen, and of a French queen ; 
for it was such an one as she had wished, — an honourable one. It 
acknowledged forever the independence of the allies for whom 
we had carried on this distant war. France, always generous, 
one might say too generous, demanded nothing for herself, and 
only gained from these campaigns an incontestable renown, 
trifling gratitude, and a heavy debt. 



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PRINCELY VISITORS. 257 

Marie Antoinette, happy in the prestige which redounded to 
the glory of the realm and her husband's reign, did not cease to 
manifest her satisfaction to all those whose bravery had con- 
tributed to this success. When, on Jan. 21, 1782, Lafayette re- 
turned unexpectedly to France, the queen, who was present at 
an entertainment at the H6tel de Ville in honour of her recent 
confinement, wished to drive Madame Lafayette to the Hdtel de 
Noailles, where her husband had just arrived, in her own carriage ; 
and when Suffren, the conqueror, appeared at Versailles, " My 
son," she said to the young dauphin, " learn early to hear pro- 
nounced, and to pronounce yourself, the names of the heroic de- 
fenders of your country. You have read the lives of great men 
in Plutarch, here is one; you must learn his name and never 
forget it." Captivated, like the nation, with the chivalrous and 
brilliant aspect of the war, the generous sovereign had not 
thought of the deficit which the enormous expenditures necessi- 
tated by so many armaments would make in our finances, nor 
of the germs of vague discontent and of restless independence 
which the contagion of example, the sight of institutions half 
understood, the attraction of novelty, the formation of an Ameri- 
can school in place of an English school, was to implant in all 
minds. She thought that she had sustained a revolt; she had 
prepared a revolution. 

The disquietudes of the war and of politics did not put an end 
to princely visits. France was always the centre of polite society. 
The court at Versailles set the fashion for all Europe; people 
thronged there from all sides. There came in 1780 the Princess 
of Hesse-Darmstadt, and the two young princesses, Louise and 
Charlotte, who had been brought up with Marie Antoinette at 
Vienna. The queen was delighted to see these friends of her 
childhood, whom she had not seen for ten years, and whom she 
loved dearly. She showed them the delights of Trianon, took 
them to a ball at the opera, gave them a place in her box at the 
play, took them for a drive in the woods of Marly and of St. 
Germain, accompanied them herself to shops, and with the affec- 
tionate experience of a woman of heart and a woman of taste, 
who feared that these Germans, but newly arrived in France, 
might be guilty of some eccentricities of toilet, recommended 
them not to make themselves too fine when coming to Trianon 
or to her box, and not to wear large hats when driving, and to 
wear at the balls given by the Comtesse Diane de Polignac, 
VOL. 1.--17 

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258 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

where she herself had had them invited, only simple dresses or 
polonaises. She received them at her table, gave them her 
portrait, overwhelmed them with presents, exhausted for them 
every refinement of friendship, and when the princesses left 
France, they carried with them, beside the incffateable remem- 
brance of a most agreeable reception, the promise of a corre- 
spondence, which was faithfully kept even in the days of anguish 
and mourning Marie Antoinette had not the same affectionate 
interest, but a more political one in the visits of the Comte and 
Comtesse du Nord. At first sight the grand-duchess, who had 
a beautiful figure, though somewhat too fat for her age, and who 
was stiff in her bearing, and fond of displaying her learning, had 
displeased her. By an unusual accident, the queen, whose 
manners were easy, and who had always an amiable word to 
say, had been embarrassed before these imperial visitors; she 
had retired to her chamber as though overcome with faintness, 
and had said, on asking for a glass of water, that she had just 
discovered that the r61e of queen was more difficult to play in 
the presence of other sovereigns, or of princes destined to be- 
come sovereigns, than before courtiers. This embarrassment, 
however, was but momentary; and her reception of her new 
guests was, on the whole, as affable and gracious as usual. 

Joseph II. had made travelling incognito the fashion. The 
Grand-duke Paul of Russia, son of Catherine II., travelled with 
his wife, a princess of Wurtemberg, under the name of the 
Comte and Comtesse du Nord. The prince had laid aside all 
his orders; the body-guard did not salute him; and the two 
wings of the door were not opened before him in the king's 
apartment. However, he had consented to lodge at the chateau, 
where the apartment of the Prince de Cond^ had been arranged 
for his reception. The travellers arrived in Paris on May 18, and 
went to Versailles on the 20th. The first interview was cold ; the 
queen, as we have said, was disturbed ; the king appeared timid, 
as usual. That evening, at dinner, all embarrassment disap- 
peared. The grand-duchess exhibited wit; the grand-duke, who 
was extremely ugly, and had a face like a Tartar, made up for 
his ugliness by the vivacity of his eyes and conversation. The 
queen, " beautiful as the day,*' animated all by her presence. 

The ice was broken. Three days later, the Comte and 
Comtesse du Nord were present at a play at Versailles in the 
royal box. The queen, anxious to please her guests, profited by 



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BALL AT VERSAILLES. 259 

this occasion to offer to the countess a magnificent fan, orna- 
mented with diamonds, and containing a lorgnette. " I know,'* 
she said graciously, "that you, like me, are somewhat near- 
sighted ; permit me to remedy that defect, and keep this simple 
ornament in memory of me." " I shall keep it all my life,*' the 
princess replied ; " for I shall owe to it the pleasure of being 
better able to see your Majesty." 

Marie Antoinette could not fail to do the honours of Trianon 
for her guests. There was given in the theatre ** Z^mire et Azor " 
by Gretry, and " Jean Fracasse au S6rail," a ballet by Gerdet ; 
the dances were gay, the costumes very rich, the actors excellent. 
After the play there was supper ; after the supper an illumina- 
tion. The garden looked like fairy-land ; the queen enjoyed all 
these splendours, which were hers, and her grace and kindness 
and delicate thoughtfulness added to them. " How much I 
should like to live with her ! " the Comtesse du Nord said, on the 
day following this entertainment. " How glad I should be if 
Monsieur le Comte du Nord were dauphin of France ! " 

Then on Saturday, June 8, there was a fancy-dress ball at 
Versailles. The salons, and especially the gallery, were beauti- 
fully decorated with a profusion of candles and girandoles. The 
whole court was in full dress, the king having ordered that every 
one should be as brilliant as possible, or not appear. The ladies 
who danced wore dominoes of white satin, with little panzers and 
little queues. But the queen outshone every one. "She had 
a manner of walking," an eye-witness said, " a graceful majesty 
in the carriage of her head, which was peculiar to her." The 
crowd, eager to see, pressed about her with such indiscretion 
that for a moment the king, feeling himself pushed, complained ; 
the grand-duke, who was near him, retreated for an instant. 
" Sire," he said, "pardon me; I have become so like the French 
that I, like them, thought that I could not approach your Majesty 
too closely." 

An early friend of the grand-duchess, who accompanied her 
on this voyage, - <^^e Baroness von Oberkirche, — relates that 
during this festival sne .. ^ H herself for a moment behind Marie 
Antoinette. 

*** Madame von Oberkirche,* the queen said to me, 'speak a little Ger- 
man to me, to see if I remember it. I only know the language of my new 
country.* I spoke a few words in German. She remained thoughtful for 
a few seconds without replying. * Ah,' she said finally, * I *m none the 



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26o LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

less happy to hear the old German ; you speak like a Saxon, without any 
Alsatian accent, which astonishes me. German is a beautiful language ; 
but it seems to me that French, in the mouth of my children, is the 
sweetest in the world.' " 

After this ball, which ended early, there was a supper at the 
house of the Princesse de Lamballe. The queen was there. 
The number was small, but very select. They played loto, 
then danced. This little improvised ball was much gayer than 
the other. The king, according to his custom, only just ap- 
peared. After his departure, respect no longer interfered with 
pleasure, and all were very well content with a sort of intimacy 
which was not disagreeable to the queen. In imitation of the 
sovereign, the royal family gave splendid entertainments to the 
august visitors. More tactful and thoughtful than the Archduke 
Maximilian, the Comte and Comtesse du Nord had taken care 
to send, on the day following their arrival, their cards to the 
princes and princesses of the blood. Flattered by this attention 
from the future emperor of all the Russias, they vied with one 
another in prodigalities for their reception. The Due d'Orl^ans 
gave them a dinner at Raincy; the Comte d*Artois offered them 
a magnificent concert and a gay collation at Bagatelle. At 
Sceaux, the excellent and venerable Due de Penthi^vre gave 
them an exquisite breakfast, followed by a drive through the 
park, of which the prince was eager himself to do the honours. 

But of all these entertainments, none could claim the brilliancy 
of those at Chantilly. The hospitality of the Condes was pro- 
verbial, and the reception of June lo, 1782, did not belie their 
reputation. There was a general illumination of the ch&teau and 
park, a hunt, a concert in the mysterious pavilion, where, seated 
upon soft sofas, one listened to invisible musicians. One might 
have fancied one was listening to the angels in heaven. After- 
ward a ball in the open-air ball-room ; a supper on the Island 
of Love, or in the hamlet, for Madame de Cond^ had her hamlet 
at Chantilly, as the queen had hers at Trianon; and finally 
another hunt by torchlight. The hunt was also one of the tra- 
ditional amusements of the Condes. When they finally sepa- 
rated, the prince said to the grand-duke, " We shall be very far 
from each other, but if your Highness permits it, and the king 
does not object, I may go some day to St. Petersburg, to re- 
turn the visit which you have done me the honour to make 
me. 



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VISIT OF THE KING OF SWEDEN. 261 

"We shall receive you with enthusiasm, Monsieur; and the 
empress will be very happy to see you in our savage country." 

** Alas ! it is only a dream," replied the Comte de Cond6, with 
a sigh. 

How could he imagine that this journey to Russia, which he 
now looked upon as a dream, he should make fifteen years later 
as a proscribed person, while that beautiful Chantilly, whose 
honours he did-with such noble prodigality, would be only a ruin 
open to the winds of heaven? 

At that moment he heard only murmurs which flattered his 
ears ; the fame of the magnificence of Chantilly had spread over 
all Europe, and this saying was circulated to the honour of the 
Cond^s : " The king received Monsieur le Comte du Nord like a 
friend ; Monsieur le Comte d*Orleans received him like a boar- 
geois, and Monsieur le Prince de Cond6, like a sovereign." 

With the public the success of the Comte and Comtesse du 
Nord was not less great than at court. Paris was infatuated with 
the future czar and czarina of all the Russias, as it had been in- 
fatuated with the emperor of Germany. Philosophers and men 
of letters offered them incense. La Harpe read them his trans- 
lation of Lucian ; Beaumarchais, his " Mariage de Figaro ; " at 
the Acad^mie des Sciences, Condorcet addressed them ; at the 
Th^dtre Fran^ais, verses were recited in their honour. Before 
their departure the king gave them some splendid tapestries 
from Gobelin ; the queen had a magnificent toilet set of Sevres 
porcelain, blue lapis, decorated with painting and enamel, and 
mounted in gold, presented to them in a most delicate manner. 
** Man Dieu, how beautiful it is ! " the grand-duchess said on see- 
ing it; "it is without doubt for the queen." " Madame," the 
superintendent, the Comte d*Angivilliers, replied, "the queen 
offers it to Madame la Comtesse du Nord ; she hopes that it will 
be agreeable to her, and that she will keep it in memory of her 
Majesty." And on looking at it a little more closely, the prin- 
cess saw that it bore her arms. 

On June 19, the Comte and Comtesse du Nord quitted Paris, 
and after having breakfasted at Choisy, set out to travel through 
France on their way back to Russia. 

Two years later the king of Sweden came in his turn. But of 
what use to describe all these princely visits? There are always 
the same details, above all, the same love of incognito. The 
king of Sweden, under the name of the Comte de Haga, arrived 



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262 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

SO unexpectedly on June 9, 1784, that Louis XVI., warned in 
haste at Rambouiilet, returned precipitately to Versailles, and 
the key of his apartment having been lost, could only appear 
before his guest in the most extraordinary costume, wearing one 
shoe with a red heel, and another with a black, a gold buckle 
and a silver buckle. With the exception of this unusual inci- 
dent, it would seem that there was the same invariable pro- 
gramme for all these august visitors, to which they all scrupu- 
lously conformed, — a supper at Versailles, a performance at the 
opera, at the Th^itre Fran^ais, at the Com^die Italienne, accom- 
panied by the plaudits of the public, an audience of Parliament, 
a session at the Academic, a visit to personages of renown and 
places of amusement, and to crown all, an entertainment at 
Trianon. 

It was Marie Antoinette's coquetry, since she no longer 
danced, being too old, herself to do the honours of her chateau 
to the crowned heads; she displayed no longer the official 
politeness of the sovereign, but the charming cordiality of a 
woman of the world; she was no longer queen, but mistress 
of her house. On that day there was a play in the theatre; 
they gave the ** Dormeur £veill6," by Marmontel and Gr^try, . 
with magnificent scenery and ballet; then a supper under the 
trees, and an illumination of the English gardens. Numerous 
guests filled the park ; all the ladies were in white. " It was 
like fairy-land," Gustavus III. himself wrote, " a scene worthy of 
the Elysian fields." At supper the queen did not wish to take 
her place at table; she was entirely occupied with doing the 
honours. With that exquisite tact and bewitching grace which 
w^ere among her charms, she conversed from preference with the 
Swedes, and affected to receive them .with great cordiality. 
Madame Campan asserts that Marie Antoinette was prejudiced 
against Gustavus III., and received him coldly. All that we know 
of this journey and the relations between the two sovereigns 
seems to contradict the assertion of Madame Campan; and if the 
little scene which she describes, wherein the queen gave a lesson 
to the Comte de Haga, really took place in the way she describes, 
it was but a momentary ebullition of anger which was quickly 
forgotten. The correspondence of Marie Antoinette and the 
king of Sweden bears the impress of the greatest cordiality. 

In the preceding year, when the young woman had had a 
miscarriage, Gustavus had exhibited the most touching sympathy 



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BALLOON ASCENSIONS. 263 

for her, ** like a good gentleman, who was sincerely touched by 
any misfortune that could happen to his friend.*' And it would 
seem that the queen was not less attached to the king of Sweden 
than the king of Sweden to the queen. The prince having 
expressed the desire that the nephew of Cardinal Bernis, in 
whom he was interested, should be made coadjutor of Alby, it 
was Marie Antoinette who undertook to overcome the obstacles 
in the way of the realization of this wish ; and having obtained 
the favour, it was she who hastened to announce it to her royal 
correspondent. Was not Gustavus III. right when he wrote a few 
years before to the Comte de Stedingk, " It is natural to be 
attached to the queen"? 

The novelty then in fashion was a balloon. "One lost on 
them,*' a chronicler has wittily said, " not only meat and drink, 
but even loto." On the sth of June, 1783, Montgolfier had made 
the first experiment at Annonay ; he had repeated it on Septem- 
ber 19 of the same year, on the Place d'Armes at Versailles, before 
the king and queen, in the midst of an immense crowd. They 
desired that the Comte de Haga should witness this diversion ; 
and on June 23, 1784, Pilatre des Rosiers, who was to perish so 
miserably the following year, and Proust, a professor of chemistry, 
set out from the court of the ministers in the count's presence, 
rising to a great distance to descend, three quarters of an hour 
later, in the forest of Chantilly. The balloon, ornamented with 
the initials of the two kings, and with a white armlet in honour 
of the king of Sweden, bore the name which then was still dear 
to France : it was called ** The Marie Antoinette." 

Finally in that same year, 1784, in the month of August, 
Prince Henry, brother of Frederick II., made a journey to 
France, more from policy, perhaps, than for pleasure ; but the 
queen had little love for anything Prussian, and, despite the admi- 
ration of the enthusiastic Prussians, who much preferred this new 
visitor to the one who had been there in June, she saw the prince 
only two or three times, and so briefly that she had but a vague 
idea of him. 

*' I have not yet had many opportunities of seeing Prince Henry,'' she 
wrote to the king of Sweden on Oct. 21, ** because since his arrival here 
I have passed most of my time at Trianon, where I have received only 
the persons I know best, and always but a few at a time. . . . Moreover, 
Monsieur le Comte de Haga may rest assured that the compliments 
and civilities of Prince Henry cannot make me forget him, or the time 
he spent here." 

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264 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

And she added, in speaking of her sojourn at Trianon, ** This 
kind of life is best suited to my health, and to the beginning of 
my pregnancy, whigh progresses happily." The queen was 
pregnant for the fourth time. In the preceding autumn, she had 
had an accident at Fontainebleau which had greatly distressed 
her; but happily her health had not been injured, and at the 
end of the year, Louis XVI. announced joyously to his brother- 
in-law, Joseph II., that he was expecting a second son. 

This second son was born on March 27, 1785, on Easter. 
This time, although she had suffered during her pregnancy, and 
particularly during the last of it, and had had fears which had 
determined her to order her conscience and to redouble her 
devotion, no such accidents occurred as had marked the birth 
of Madame Royale; her deliverance was fortunate, and so 
prompt that at Paris one heard of her travail and of the birth 
at the same time. The child, like its brother and sister, was 
baptized on the same day in the chapel of the ch&teau, under 
the name of Louis Charles, Due de Normandie. He had for 
godfather, Monsieur le Comte de Provence, and for godmother, 
the queen of the two Sicilys, Marie Caroline of Lorraine, repre- 
sented by Madame Elisabeth. 

On the following day, Paris celebrated this great event with 
public rejoicings; distributions of provisions were made among 
the people ; fifteen fountains poured forth wine in profusion ; a 
bonfire was lighted on the Place de Gr^ve, and in the evening 
the entire city was illuminated. What was better worth while, 
all the debtors for nurses retained in I^ Force were set free. 
On the 1st of April, a solemn Te Denm was sung in Notre Dame. 
On May 24, the queen came in her turn to the old cathedral to 
render thanks unto God for her third child. 

The ceremony was brilliant, as usual. In the morning the 
corps de ville, in their velvet robes, assembled at the Hdtel de 
Ville, and afterward went to fetch the Due de Brissac, governor 
of Paris; then with the escort of the Guards of Paris and the 
Swiss Guards, they betook themselves in their gala coaches to 
the Gate of the Conference, to await the queen. The French 
Guards and the Swiss Guards formed the line. At nine o'clock 
the cannon from the Invalides announced the arrival of the royal 
cortege. The corps de ville advanced to meet it, knelt down, and 
the provost of merchants, after being presented by the governor, 
addressed his congratulations to Marie Antoinette. The latter 



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BANKRUPTCY OF THE PRINCE DE GU£m£n£E. 265 

replied with her habitual grace ; then the door of the carriage 
was closed, and the corUge continued its way to the cathedral. 
The queen there performed her devotions;, she afterward knelt 
at Ste. Genevieve, and joined in the prayers for the end of the 
frightful drought which was then desolating France. Later she 
went to dine at the Tuileries. Then she went to the opera with 
her sister-in-law, Madame Elisabeth, then to the Temple to sup 
with the Comte d*Artois. After supper she entered her carriage, 
and following the boulevard, was driven to the Place Louis XV., 
to see the fireworks and the illumination of the colonnade. 

On the following day, Marie Antoinette dined with her friend 
the Princesse de Lamballe, and afterward went to the Com^die 
Itallenne, then returned to Versailles. The acclamations, which 
were rare in the city, had been warmer at the opera, and the 
queen had replied to them, a chronicler has said, ** by more fre- 
quent and gracious reverences than usual." 

The young prince had received, on the very day of his birth, 
the ribbon of the St. Esprit ; then he had been placed, with his 
brother and sister, in the hands of the governess of the Children 
of France. This was no longer, as at the previous confinements 
of the queen, the Princesse de Guim^n^e ; a frightful catas- 
trophe had forced her to quit Versailles. In the month of Sep- 
tember, 1782, after having been previously announced two or 
three times, the bankruptcy of the Prince de Gu^m^n^e had 
been declared. ** It was the bankruptcy of a sovereign," some 
one said, in allusion to the pretensions of the De Rohans to 
be treated as a royal house. The deficit was not less than 
twenty-eight millions. There was in all Paris and in all France 
a general hue and cry. All classes of society suffered : besides 
the nobles, such as the Due de Lauzun and the Comte de Coislin, 
and men of letters, such as Thomas, and the Abbi de Lille, 
there were found among the creditors — and these were the ones 
who suffered most — servants, small merchants, porters, the Bre- 
ton sailors, who had carried their savings to the descendant of 
the Due de Bretagne. The prince, by his prodigalities, the 
princess, by her expenditures, to which she was indeed forced 
by her position, had squandered everything. The Rohans made 
unheard-of efforts to hush up the sad affair; Madame de Gu^mi- 
n6e gave up her diamonds ; Madame de Marsan sold her horses ; 
the Duchesse de Montbazan returned her jewels to the jewellers 
who had furnished them. But after such a scandal Madame de 



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266 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

Gu^m^n^e could not remain at court; she handed in her resig- 
nation as governess to the Children of France. 

Who should replace her? Several names suggested themselves 
to the queen. But the Princesse de Chimay seemed to her too 
austere ; the Duchesse de Duras too learned and too witty. 

Public rumour hinted at the Duchesse de Polignac; but did she 
desire it.^ ** I know her/* the queen said. ** This office would in 
no way conform to her simple and quiet tastes and to a sort of 
indolence of character; it would be the greatest proof of devo- 
tion she could give me if she should yield to my desires." 
When Monsieur de Besenval went to speak to Marie Antoi- 
nette of the rumour, as a deputy from the relatives and friends 
of the duchess, who were always eager to augment an influence 
which they found to their advantage, ** Madame de Polignac?" 
she replied. "I thought you knew her better; she does not 
wish for the place." And, in fact, Madame de Polignac, who was 
of a calm and somewhat indolent disposition, recoiled before 
a title whose chain was heavy. But her friends desired for her 
the prestige which this office would give her, which was one of 
the most important of the perpetual ones. They urged her; the 
queen insisted; and the favourite, moved by the desire of her 
royal protectress, and accustomed, thanks to her very indolence, 
to yield to the importunities of those around her, ended by ac- 
cepting. She was nominated, and the queen w'as happy. At 
bottom, what Marie Antoinette desired was to be, under cover of 
her friend, the governess of her children herself. Thanks to this 
choice, it was possible for her, without fear of trespassing against 
etiquette, or hurting any one's vanity, to direct as she desired 
their education, and to forget near them at any hour of the day 
the chagrin which was beginning to assail her, and the responsi- 
bilities of politics, in which the fatality of the time constrained 
her to mingle. 



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CHAPTER XIX. 

The Queen in Politics; her Natural Distaste for Affairs.— 
Distrust of Maurefas. — Letter from the Queen to Joseph 
II. — Appointment of Messieurs de SfeouR and de Castries. —The 
Queen's Sympathy for Necker ; she supports him in the Pub- 
lication OF HIS Accounts. — The Fall of Necker. — The Death 
OF Maurepas. — JOLY DE Fleury. — D*Ormesson. — Calonne. — 
The Small Part that Marie Antoinette took in the Nomina- 
tion OF THE Latter ; her Dislike of him. — Austrian Politics. 
— The Election of Maximilian at Cologne. — The Dispute of 
Joseph II. with Holland. — " The Marriage of Figaro." — The 
Queen plays "The Barber of Seville" at Trianon. 

THE queen had never cared for politics, and everything had 
conspired to keep her aloof from them, — her own dislike, 
which the importunities of her mother and the counsels of Mercy 
had not always succeeded in conquering; her education, which had 
only been directed toward accomplishments ; the traditions of a 
court where since Anne of Austria no wife of the king had ever 
taken part in affairs ; the distrust of the ministers, who feared the 
irresistible ascendancy which Marie Antoinette could not fail 
to take should she one day bring to bear on the complications 
of politics the whole strength of a mind quick, just, firm, and 
persuasive. 

** The more I have the honour of seeing the queen," the Baron de 
Stael wrote, ** the more am I strengthened in the opinion I have always 
held of the excellence of her character. She loves truth, and one can 
speak it to her if she be persuaded of the probity and disinterestedness of 
him who speaks. In discoursing with nobility and frankness one is sure to 
please her, even if one holds an opinion contrary to her own ; as soon as 
she discovers falseness or flattery, she has a horror of them." 

It was this very excellence of character which the ministers 
feared. Vergennes and Maurepas, above all, endeavoured to 
keep the king on his guard against all interference of the queen 
in affairs. The old minister, urged by his wife, who ruled him 



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268 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

completely, and who as aunt of the Due d'Aiguillon bore no 
love to Marie Antoinette, under a mask of respect and deference 
combated with obstinate perseverance and the experience of a 
diplomat the possible influence of the young sovereign. Madame 
Campan even accuses him of having sought to compromise her. 
When the malice of courtiers had tried to use her promenades 
on the terrace at Versailles against Marie Antoinette, Maurepas 
** had had the cruel policy to reply to the king that he should 
allow her to do as she pleased ; that she had intelligence ; that 
her friends were ambitious, and desirous of seeing her take part in 
affairs ; and that it was best to allow her to gs.in a reputation for 
levity." It does not seem probable that the astute old man 
would have dared to use any such language to his master; 
Louis XVI. would not have allowed it. But that he was in- 
wardly delighted at the queen's taste for frivolity; that he 
discreetly insinuated these very thoughts, which he dared not 
publicly express; that he encouraged in secret the young woman 
to give herself up to amusement, and the king not to talk to her 
of affairs, or to hide them from her; that he had even redoubled 
his efforts after the first pregnancy of the queen had strengthened 
the friendship of husband and wife, to prevent the " sensibility of 
his master from having any influence over affairs in general," — 
does not appear doubtful. The most authentic documents, the 
secret reports of the ambassador from Austria and of the min- 
ister from Prussia, establish it irrefutably, and the queen her- 
self laboured under no illusion as to the situation in which she 
was placed. 

"He — the king — is naturally little gallant," she wrote to her brother; 
" and it often happens that he does not talk to me of important affairs, even 
when he has no desire to hide them from me. He repllies when I question 
him, but he does not broach them ; and when I learn the quarter of an 
affair, I have need of much address to get the ministers to tell me the rest 
of it by allowing them to believe that the king has told me all. When I re- 
proach the king for not having spoken to me of certain things, he does not 
grow angry, "but has a somewhat embarrassed air, and sometimes answers 
naturally that he had not thought of it I confess to you that political 
affairs are those in which I take the least interest. The natural mistrust of 
the king was originally fortified by his governor ; even before his marriage 
Monsieur de la Vauguyon had made him afraid of the empire which his 
wife might gain over him, and his dark soul had amused itself by frighten- 
ing his pupU with all the phantoms invented against the House of Austria. 



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MONTBARREY IS MINISTER OF WAR. 269 

Monsieur de Maurepas, although possessed of less character and malice, 
has thought it advantageous to his power to encourage the king in these 
ideas. Monsieur de Vergennes follows the same course, and perhaps 
makes use of his correspondence with foreign affairs to introduce falsity 
and lies. I have spoken to the king frankly on this subject more than 
once. He has sometimes answered me angrily, and as he is incapable 
of discussion, I have not been able to convince him that his minister was 
deceived, or deceived him. I am not blind with regard to my influence ; 
I know that as far as politics are concerned, 1 have little ascendancy over 
the king." 

The queen was repeatedly advised to conciliate Maurepas, 
either to win him over by favours, or to intimidate him by her 
ascendancy, but under no circumstances to arouse his antagonism 
by affecting to get on without him ; to make of him an ally and 
not an adversary. The king himself urged her to do so. She had 
never consented, and had never been willing to win the minister 
either by force or kindness. Was this owing to the pressure of 
those about her, to the insinuations of Choiseul's partisans, as 
Von Goltz and Mercy believed? Or was it simply natural pride 
or indiflference to affairs? Whatever it was, during the first years 
of her reign, save the part she took in the dismissal of Turgot — 
a part to be regretted, but wherein she was fully in accord with 
public opinion, excited against the reforms of the minister — and 
her interest in the affair of Bavaria, the true extent of which 
interest we have shown, she had always held aloof from politics. 
It was not till 1780 that she seemed disposed to concern herself 
with affairs, and, as Mercy says, with important affairs ; and then 
her intervention was limited to influencing the appointment of 
a minister, the minister of war. 

When in September, 1777, the Comte de Saint-Germain fell 
before the storms incited by his innovations, the Prince de Mont- 
barrey, assistant-director, remained alone in charge of the depart- 
ment; but his talents were by no means equal to the heavy 
burden which he had assumed. Brave and witty, but disliking 
work, unable to resist the solicitations of women or the importu- 
nities of the courtiers, he allowed discipline to become lax, and 
disorder to creep into his administration. Maurepas alone, and 
his wife, a relative of Madame de Montbarrey, supported him ; 
but the clamour of the army became too strong. The minister 
was allowed to hand in his resignation and was obliged to retire ; 
and public opinion approved of his disgrace. The Polignac 



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270 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

set wished to have the Comte d'Adhemar appointed in his 
place; the queen opposed him, and despite Maurepas, who 
proposed Monsieur de Puys^gur, or his nephew, the Due 
d'Aiguillon, had the portfolio of war given to Monsieur de S6gur, 
lieutenant-general, — a brave officer, who had acquitted himself 
well in the campaign in Flanders, and lost an arm at the battle of 
Laufeld. On the day he was presented, the queen said to Ma- 
dame Campan, "You have just seen a minister according to my 
way of thinking. I have no anxiety for the king's service : the 
appointment is an excellent one ; but I am almost sorry for the 
part which I took in it I have assumed a responsibility; I 
should be happy not to have any, and to escape from it always 
as much as possible. I have just promised Monsieur de S^gur, 
and that on my word of honour, not to recommend any appli- 
cant, and in no wise to interfere with any of his operations by 
petitions for my prot6g^s." 

If we turn to the Memoirs of the Comte de S^gur, we shall 
find that Marie Antoinette was not always faithful to this promise, 
and that one day her demands were so pressing that the old 
officer, growing impatient, wished to hand in his resignation. 
The queen was displeased ; but after a long interview with the 
minister's son, she understood his reasons. ** Say to your father," 
she said to him, "that we are reconciled, and that I am only 
angry with him for the temper he showed in offering his resig- 
nation." With this exception, Marie Antoinette had no cause 
to repent of her appointment. Monsieur de S6gur, who had 
been made marshal in 1783, was very superior to his predeces- 
sor both in talent and in character ; and the most of the meas- 
ures which he undertook did honour to the minister and his 
protectress. 

For a long time it was believed that the queen had done as 
much for the navy as she had for the department of war, and 
that she had contributed to the dismissal of Sartines, and to the 
elevation of the Marquis de Castries. The truth is that this 
nomination, which, moreover, was no surprise, was due solely to 
an intrigue of Madame de Polignac, of the Comte de Vaudreuil, 
and of the comptroller-general, who was a friend of Monsieur de 
Castries. Marie Antoinette had no part in it; she had always 
protected Castries, and she continued to do so to the end, and 
aided in obtaining for him an excellent pension. 

It was Maurepas, who, deceived by false information, and 



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NECKER'S FALL. 27 1 



believing himself to be doing an act of great policy, had himself 
lent a hand to the combination proposed by Necker. He 
avenged himself by dismissing Necker in his turn, by means of 
a little strategy, analogous to the one of which he had been the 
dupe. 

The queen was afflicted at this disgrace. Despite the lack of 
savoir vivre of the Genevan, who on his presentation had famil- 
iarly taken her hand and kissed it without her permission, she 
liked Necker, and for a long time shared the popular infatuation 
for him. It was she in great part who, despite Maurepas, had 
induced Louis XVL to authorize the publication of the famous 
" Account," which was the first appeal to the intervention of pub- 
lic opinion in the management of the finances and the administra- 
tion of the State. But the old minister redoubled his attacks ; 
his cutting pleasantries on the subject of the " Account," which 
he called in jest the Conte bleu, the criticisms incited by the inno- 
vations of the comptroller-general, which many considered dan- 
gerous, his pretensions, often indiscreet, finished in a short time 
by undermining his credit; and on May 19, i/gi, he handed in 
his resignation, despite the queen's efforts to prevent his fall, 
and to induce him to remain. The clamour at this fall was great : 
" All impartial p.ersons are grieved," a lady of the court wrote. 
Public opinion at Paris and in the country became alarmed ; one 
saw in the event almost the ruin of the credit of France. The 
system of Necker, who supplemented the taxes by loans, flat- 
tered a light and frivolous nation, who only saw the momentary 
relief, without thinking of the inevitable burdens entailed in the 
future, and who did not calculate that the loans, whose actual 
revenues did not suffice to pay the interest on them, would lead 
fatally and with brief delay to crushing taxes, or to a disastrous 
bankruptcy. The complaints were widespread among the pub- 
lic; the most moderate, even those who blamed certain of 
Necker's plans, said that one might have restrained his imagina- 
tion while profiting by his talent for finance. As for the queen, 
she openly avowed her regret ; she shut herself up in her room 
for an entire day to weep, and hastened to write to her brother 
that she had in no way participated in this change of ministers, 
and that she was very sorry for it. 

Maurepas did not long enjoy his victory. The old minister 
was visibly failing ; violent attacks of a disease to which he was 
subject — the gout — tormented him incessantly. In the month 



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2^2 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

of November, 1781, the disease became more serious; gangrene 
set in, and all hope was given up. When the Due de Lauzun 
brought to Paris the brilliant news of the capitulation of Corn- 
wallis, and some one went to announce it to the prime minister, 
*' I am no longer of this world," he replied. He none the less 
had the messenger enter ; but the interview was short ; the old 
man was dying. On the i6th the last sacrament was admin- 
istered to him; on the 21st, at eleven o'clock of the evening, he 
ceased to breathe. 

He passed away in an hour of triumph, — a triumph too fugi- 
tive, alas ! one which could not conceal or dissipate the perils 
of the future. From the ministers of Louis XV. Maurepas had 
inherited a France exhausted, discontented, agitated by inward 
throes which preceded and presaged a revolution. After seven 
years and a half of the absolute power which the king had 
allowed him, he disappeared from the scene, leaving the situa- 
tion as disturbed as in the beginning, the finances as exhausted, 
an uncertain policy, and an authority less respected than ever. 
Attacked at each instant by those pamphlets which he loved so 
dearly, and those songs in which he was a past master ; a thou- 
sand germs of revolt having been excited among the populace ; 
the public having been irritated by deceptions, and the more 
exacting because it had been deceived, — the incurable frivolity 
of the old minister had allowed all the springs to become re- 
laxed, the resources to dissipate themselves in pure loss. He 
left the ship of State — on which, according to the saying of a 
contemporary, he had been a passenger rather than a pilot — 
destitute of a rudder, and exposed to every storm. 

Louis XVI. none the less regretted this minister, whom he was 
wont to consider as his mentor, and for whom the ties of habit 
had become those of friendship. ** Ah," he said, with tears in 
his eyes, when he learned of Maurepas's death, **I shall no 
longer hear my old friend overhead every morning." He had 
shown the minister every attention during his last illness, and 
had himself announced the birth of the dauphin to him. When 
the queen sought to console the king, he replied that he should 
never forget the sacrifices which Monsieur de Maurepas had 
made for him, in leaving his estates and the agreeable life which 
he could there have led, to come to serve him as a father. 

Who was to receive this difficult heritage? The subject had 
occupied many minds for a long time, as the age of the prime 



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D*ORMESSON AS COMPTROLLER-GENERAL. 273 

minister warranted neither long hopes nor long years. Some 
named the Due de Nivernais, whom the king of Prussia favoured, 
so it was said. Others inclined toward Sartines, toward Ma- 
chault, toward D'Ossun. Choiseul or Necker were again spoken 
of, — the two whom an epigram called ** receipt and expenditure." 
Madame Adelaide, again in favour, urged the Cardinal de Bernis. 
The queen, who kept a vigilant watch on this point, and who, a 
chronicler said, " had the delicacy not to wish to share with any 
one an intimacy which she flattered herself she alone merited, 
both by her zeal for the State and her attachment to the king, 
and by the purity of her views," — the queen would have pre- 
ferred the archbishop of Toulouse, Lom^nie de Brienne, a 
friend of Vermond, who had the reputation of being an eminent 
administrator; but she dared not propose him, knowing her 
husband's absolute repugnance to invest any one with so impor- 
tant a title, and his extreme fear of being governed. She was 
not wrong; Louis XVI. took no prime minister, and Maurepas 
had no successor. Vergennes, the principal personage in the 
cabinet, became the directing minister, without, however, having 
the title. 

Joly de Fleury had succeeded Necker, and was minister of 
finance ; but having neither the cleverness nor popularity of his 
predecessor, he soon fell beneath the weight of his many mis- 
takes. D'Ormesson, who took his place on the express desire of 
the king, with the title of comptroller-general, which was re-estab- 
lished for him, joined to a name made illustrious in Parliament 
a reputation for integrity beyond proof. He was only thirty-one 
years old, and alleged his youth and inexperience as an excuse 
for refusing the perilous post which was offered him. "I am 
younger than you," Louis XVI. replied; "and my position is 
more difficult than the one I confide to you." Marie Antoinette 
was pleased at this appointment; and the approbation which she 
openly expressed was the more meritorious in that D'Ormesson 
had not hesitated to expose himself to her displeasure. Before 
his appointment as comptroller-general, a historian relates, he 
had come in direct opposition to the queen in his quality as 
councillor of State charged with the direction of St. Cyr. The 
queen having recommended some young persons to him whom 
she wished to have placed in that house, he had laid before the 
king a list which contained their names, and on the margin that 
of their protectress ; but on the same list he had presented other 
VOL. I.— 18 

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274 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

young persons, without support, whose rights he advocated, a::d 
Louis XVI. had chosen the latter. 

D'Ormesson brought to his office the same austerity of prin-' 
ciple and the same disinterestedness that he had shown in the 
government of St. Cyr. Unfortunately, in so delicate a matter 
neither honesty nor determined energy could take the place of 
acquired experience. D'Ormesson made mistakes; his ill-con- 
trived operations displeased business men ; his probity irritated 
the courtiers. They ridiculed his honesty; and at the end of 
seven months he was obliged to retire. 

Intrigues were again on foot; many names were advanced: 
S6nac de Meilhan, intendant of Hainaut; Foulon, former inten- 
dant of Paris ; Lom^nie de Brienne, archbishop of Toulouse. It 
was the intendant of Flanders, Monsieur de Calonne, who won ; 
he was named comptroller-general on Oct. 23, 1783. 

Twenty years before, a minister of Louis XV., Monsieur de 
Boynes, had written the following lines concerning this per- 
sonage : — 

" Whatever one may say concerning Monsieur de Calonne, I still sus- 
pend my judgment of him ; but for the present he seems to roe to be 
a man of more brilliant than solid parts, to be possessed of more ver- 
satility than capacity. I fear that he owes his reputation to the ease 
with which he expresses himself, and to a certain pleasing air, which 
succeeds especially with women." 

Monsieur de Boynes was not mistaken. Light, brilliant, witty, 
amiable in the full acceptation of the term, with a handsome face 
and a keen and piercing look, of a well-turned figure, a noble 
and easy politeness, without haughtiness or pretension, with a sort 
of responsible air, which marked the man in office, a lively in- 
telligence, fertile in expedients rather than in resource, clever 
at intrigue rather than great enterprises, more solicitous of his 
elegance than his gravity, with a great talent for work, but an in- 
surmountable horror of figures, and of incurable frivolity, Monsieur 
de Calonne had all the qualities of a man of the world, but very 
few of those of a statesman, and still less of those of a financier. 
He was a genius, moreover, who was eminently dangerous, be- 
cause people were easily taken in by his deductions, drawn from 
false premises and untrustworthy data, and because his imagina- 
tion conceived, and his eloquence caused to be adopted, measures 
which neither good sense nor good reason could countenance. 



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APPOINTMENT OF CALONNE. 275 

Formerly favoured by Choiseul, and successively intendant of 
Rennes, of Metz, and of Lille, but burdened with debts, owing 
everybody, he had scented the comptroller-generalship for a long 
time. On the fall of Necker, to which he had contributed by his 
pamphlets, some of which — his *' Why," and his '* Letter from 
the Marquis Caraccioli " — had enjoyed great success, he had 
hoped to arrive at this end. He played picquet with Madame 
de Maurepas, and courted Monsieur de Maurepas ; but the old 
minister had replied warmly to a person who had spoken to him 
of Calonne as a successor to Necker, " Fie, then ! he is a fool, a 
basket with a hole in the bottom ! Put the finances in his hands ! 
The royal treasury would soon be as dry as his purse ! " Joly de 
Fleury, then D'Ormesson, had been preferred. 

Calonne, however, had not been discouraged. Repulsed by 
the prime minister, repelled by the king, looked upon with dis- 
favour by the queen, he turned to the capitalists, to the courtiers, 
and to the princes. He said, or caused to be said, that he alone 
knew the means of directing the finances of a great monarchy 
so as to bring abundance to the royal treasury without descending 
to the petty economies which had so stupidly depressed the court. 
In a word, the people would see that he knew how to conciliate 
the interests of public and private fortune. It was thought that 
he had superior talents because he treated the most serious things 
lightly. The Comte d'Artois was won over ; Madame de Polignac 
and the Comte de Vaudreuil were infatuated ; the lieutenant of 
police, Lenoir, was interested; the court banker, Monsieur 
d*Harvelay, whose wife was Calonne's mistress, undertook to win 
over Vergennes, and when D'Ormesson handed in his resignation, 
all the batteries were ready. Madame de Polignac, seconded by 
the Baron de Breteuil, betook herself to the queen to implore her 
patronage for.her prot^g^. The queen resisted for some time ; 
but finally, importuned by her favourite and urged by a man 
in whom she had confidence, Breteuil, she promised, not to advo- 
cate the appointment of Monsieur de Calonne, but to confer with 
the king concerning it on the.followingday ; and on that day the 
appeals of Madame de Polignac, the importunities of Monsieur 
de Vaudreuil, of the Due de Coigny, and of the Comte d'Artois, 
the complaisance and, it was thought, the secret support of Mon- 
sieur de Vergennes, wrung from the two sovereigns the nomina- 
tion of a man for whom they had neither taste, liking, nor esteem, 
but who had the sympathies of** beautiful womea" 



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276 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

The queen soon repented ; she was provoked with Madame de 
Polignac for her intervention in the affair, and did not hide hei 
displeasure. One day she allowed herself to say to the duchess 
that the finances had passed from the hands of an honest man 
without talent to those of a clever intriguer. Calonne heard of it ; 
he did everything to conquer the dislike of his sovereign, and to win 
her good grace, seeking to divine her smallest desires, forestalling 
all that she could demand, even flattering her love for good deeds, 
and endeavouring to take advantage of her charity. During the 
very severe winter of 1783 and 1784 the king had given three mil- 
lion livres to the poor; Calonne had come to the queen to offer 
to give her one of them, in order that she might distribute it in 
her name, and according to her desire. The queen declined, and 
replied that the whole sum should be distributed in the name of 
the king ; that as for her, she should deprive herself of certain 
things in order to add to the relief of the unfortunate people as 
far as her savings would permit. When Calonne departed, she 
called Madame Campan and said to her, " Congratulate me ; I 
have just escaped a trap, or at least something which in the end 
would have caused me great annoyance; " and she added, "That 
man will succeed in ruining the finances of the State. They say 
that I appointed him ; they have made the people believe that I 
am prodigal. I have just declined a sum from the royal treas- 
ury, and even for the most respectable uses have never desired 
that any money should pass through my hands." 

Despite the efforts of the comptroller-general, the queen was 
inflexible ; the very attentions which he affected to show her re- 
doubled her aversion to him ; and Calonne, in his turn, obstinately 
repulsed by Marie Antoinette, became one of her most implacable 
enemies. We shall find proof of this later. 

At this moment the. attention of the young sovereign was 
absorbed by a more important matter. 

The restless ambition of Joseph II. sought everywhere to en- 
large and increase the influence of Austria. In 1780 one of the 
archdukes, Maximilian, had been elected coadjutor of Cologne. 
Maria Theresa, who was still living, had appealed, with that 
unctuous and pressing insistence of which she so well knew the 
secret, to her daughter; she had represented to her that for her 
own good and that of France it was necessary to circumvent the 
evil intentions of Frederick II., ** that wicked neighbour, danger- 
ous to our * holy religion,' dangerous to France and Austria, 



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ATTEMPT TO OPEN THE SCHELDT. 277 

whose interests were identical." Marie Antoinette, who was still 
very sensitive to everything that personally concerned her brothers 
and sisters, and in particular Maximilian, — Marie Antoinette, 
who held the king of Prussia " in horror," had warmly espoused 
her brother's cause. She had spoken to Maurepas ; and Vergennes 
having made no serious objection, and the king having approved, 
the French minister to Cologne, the Comte de Chdlons, had worked 
for the archduke, who had been elected coadjutor of Cologne and 
of Miinster, with the future succession. 

Four years later the affair threatened to become more serious ; 
it was no longer a question concerning the empire, but concerning 
Europe. Maria Theresa was dead; and Joseph II. had neither 
the wisdom of his mother nor the high consideration which she 
enjoyed from the whole world. He had even wounded French 
sentiment during the American war, by not sufficiently hiding 
his sympathy with England, and by announcing his intention of 
visiting that country, which at such a time had also hurt Marie 
Antoinette. None the less it was to his sister that he turned 
when his affairs became embroiled. 

The treaties of 1715 had closed the mouths of the Scheldt, 
and given them in charge of Holland. The emperor bore with 
impatience this arrangement, which was so disadvantageous to 
the commerce of the Lower Countries, and, above all, to that of 
Antwerp. Already during the war in America, he had broached 
the subject and had even made overtures to France, who, while 
not opposing any serious objection, had asked him to wait until 
after the peace. When the peace was signed, he reopened the 
affair, demanded the free navigation of the river, and on the 
refusal of the States-General gave the order to one of his ships 
to force a passage. The Hollanders fired upon the ship and cap- 
tured it. Immediately an Austrian army was assembled on the 
frontier; and the States-General, in alarm, solicited the aid of 
France. At Paris and Versailles popular opinion, always preju- 
diced against the ambitions of the House of Hapsburg, pro- 
nounced energetically in favour of Holland. The ministers met 
and demanded prompt action against Austria. And the most 
ardent against these projects of Joseph II. were those per- 
sons whom public opinion regarded as the prot6g6s of Marie 
Antoinette, — the minister of war, S^gur, the minister of the 
marine, Castries, and the former French ambassador to Vienna, 
the Baron de Breteuil. 



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278 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

To avoid any explosion, the emperor wrote to his sister. As 
early as 1783 he had complained of the unfriendly disposition 
of France, who, he said, too easily forgot the advantages which 
she gained from the Austrian alliance, and wished to reserve to 
herself alone all the benefits. * In 1784 he renewed his complaints 
and his demands. The queen only opposed a plea in bar to these 
recriminations; her influence, she said, was far from being as 
strong as he imagined. Would it be prudent for her to have 
scenes with the ministers concerning an affair in which she was 
sure the king would not second her? Louis XVI., appealed to, 
in his turn, offered his mediation and nothing more. The em- 
peror was displeased at this coldness, and did not hide his indig- 
nation. ** As long as France was engaged in the American war," 
he said to La Marck, ** I abstained from pressing my rights upon 
Holland, although it would then have been difficult for France 
to oppose them. They should repay me at Versailles for the 
confidence and moderation which I showed at that time." 

In the letter which he addressed to his sister he protested 
again that he was looking for no territorial aggrandizement on 
the side of the Low Countries, but simply a reparation of the in- 
sult offered to his flag. With the king he was more explicit; he 
demanded the cession of the fortress of Maestricht, and of its 
territory, and a few days later he had Mercy communicate to the 
cabinet of Versailles a memorandum in which he joined the 
agreement with Holland to a project of exchange of the Lower 
Countries for Bavaria, — a project to which, he said, neither the 
elector-palatine nor the Due de Deux-Ponts would be hostile. 

This was contrary to the stipulations of the peace of Teschen. 
The king pointed this out to the emperor, who renounced this 
new pretension. 

But the Holland question did not progress. The tempers 
became bitter on both sides. The queen did all she could to 
pacify them ; she talked in vain to the king, to Vergennes, even 
delaying sending a note in the hope that in the interval a more 
conciliatory reply might arrive from Vienna. The situation be- 
came strained. The States-General delayed payment. Joseph II., 
instigated by Leopold, sent them his ultimatum ; and in reply, an 
order was given to assemble two French corps, — one on the 
borders of the Rhine, the other on the frontiers of Flanders, — 
under the orders of the Prince de Cond^. 

The queen was alarmed to the last degree ; her affections, her 



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SHE ACTS AS MEDIATOR. 279 

interests, were at stake ; her heart and her reason revolted against 
a war which would have been in her eyes fratricidal ; she could 
not face without trembling the rupture of an alliance in which 
her mother, whom she still mourned, had accustomed her to see 
the safeguard of the peace of the world, the surest guarantee of 
the happiness of the people, and the support of her holy religion. 
Its dissolution would have destroyed forever her happiness and 
tranquillity. She distrusted Vergennes, nor was she wrong. The 
sympathies of Vergennes were with Prussia, to the point of writing 
this phrase, whose realization in this century has produced the 
sad results which we know, " If it be necessary to choose be- 
tween the branches of the House of Bourbon in Italy and that of 
the Prussian power in Germany, we cannot hesitate in abandoning 
the former and maintaining the latter." 

The queen remarked that the language of the king when she 
saw him alone, and before any one else, always differed from 
that which he used after a conference with his minister. Might 
she not conclude that at bottom her husband's opinion was the 
same as her own, and that it was Vergennes who influenced him? 
And if she deceived herself in this opinion, was his apparent 
duplicity likely to enlighten her? Consequently she determined 
not to see the king and his minister in each other's presence, 
and she increased her efforts to arrive at a solution of the diffi- 
culties ; she was in haste to put an end to them, and to prevent 
any outbreak; she urged the king, the ministers, as well as the 
emperor, not to raise new impediments and pretensions. But 
whatever may have been her confidence — we might say, her 
illusion — with regard to the disinterestedness of her brother, 
she never lost sight of the superior interests of the country over 
which she reigned. And one day when the ambassador from 
Sweden, during a private audience, led the conversation to the 
grave question of Holland, which was then absorbing the at- 
tention of all courts, the queen, after having expressed herself 
frankly on the subject in the intimacy of a private conversation, 
added warmly, ** Moreover, you may be very sure that I shall 
never interfere in anyway, so soon as a course has been adopted, 
and that under all circumstances I shall never forget, despite my 
friendship for the emperor, that I am queen of France and 
mother of the dauphin." And despite her lack of sympathy for 
Vergennes, she twice refused to receive the Due de Choiseul 
and his sister, the Duchesse de Gramont, who were impla- 



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28o LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

cable enemies of the minister. On the other hand, she be* 
sought Joseph II. to put the king in a position to be able to 
induce the Hollanders to make the reparation which they owed 
him, by reassuring them with regard to his intention of conquest 
and aggrandizement; and even when she urged her brother to 
use firm language, it was only in order to arrive more quickly 
at a solution, such was her haste to dispel that phantom of war 
which haunted her. 

By means of negotiations, exchange of letters and despatches, 
they finally succeeded in formulating the following propositions: 

" The emperor should renounce the opening of the Scheldt ; the Hol- 
landers should oflfer a verbal reparation for the insult to the Austrian flag, 
and should cede Maestricht, but this place being considered by them as a 
necessary bulwark against Germany, the emperor should immediately cede 
it back to them for a pecuniary indemnity." 

The States-General accepted ; they consented to make an apol- 
ogy, and immediately sent two deputies, the Count of Wasse- 
naer and the Baron of Leyden, to Vienna to make it ; but with 
their commercial instincts, they haggled over the price they were 
to pay. Joseph II. demanded nine million five hundred thousand 
florins; the Republic wished to give only five millions. The 
affair dragged along. The arrangement, which was fixed for 
the 1st, then for the isth of March, was put off" until the 15th 
of September ; bitterness was engendered ; the emperor grew im- 
patient at the successive delays ; the queen even more so, — less, 
she said, from resentment than from a desire to arrive as quickly 
as possible at a good solution, and to avoid a war. 

It was necessary to come to some conclusion. France assumed 
that part of the debt which the States-General would not pay, but at 
the same time assured herself, an historian has said, of advantages 
greatly outweighing the sacrifice ; and the preliminaries of the 
peace were finally signed on Sept. 20, 1785, and were followed 
six months later by a treaty between France and Holland. Such 
generosity was clever, and wise men thought that they had not 
paid too dearly for the preservation of European peace, and for 
the maintenance of two alliances, one of which guaranteed them 
for a long time from a continental war, and the other of which had 
so recently rendered important services during the naval war with 
England. 

But the public, which is always short-sighted in matters of 



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"THE MARRIAGE OF FIGARO." 28 1 

policy, censured what seemed to them a prodigality. They held 
Marie Antoinette responsible for it, and asserted that she had sent 
to her brother millions from France, — an unworthy lie, which is 
refuted by a simple investigation of the facts, and which Joseph 
II. himself took care to deny, when he said on his death-bed, ** I 
am aware that the enemies of my sister Antoinette have accused 
her of having sent me considerable sums. I declare, on the point 
of appearing before God, that this is an abominable calumny.*' 

Though not a political affair like the foregoing, another affair 
at this time absorbed all minds in France, which, while seemingly 
of a purely literary character, yet assumed the proportions of a 
great political question, and caused more ink to be spilled, more 
remarks to be circulated, more diplomacy to be used, and more 
intrigues to be concerted, than if a treaty between two powers had 
been in question. There were, in truth, two powers in opposi- 
tion, — the ancient power of the monarchy, the newer power of 
public opinion. Should the new comedy of Beaumarchais, 
"The Marriage of Figaro," be played? Such was the problem 
which occupied the salons and the academies. The piece had 
been accepted at the Th^dtre Frangais at the end of 1781; 
but the censorship had prohibited its representation, and at 
the beginning of 1784 the representation had not yet taken 
place. The king had commanded Madame Campan to read 
the manuscript to him, in the queen's presence; he had been 
profoundly disgusted with the libertine tone which prevailed, 
and at the attacks without number which the piece contained on 
the administration and institutions of the country, and against 
the majority of received ideas, which formed the basis of the 
then national order. His good sense understood the peril of 
such insinuations, emphasized and annotated by the factious 
spirit of the epoch. At the tirade against State prisons he rose 
brusquely. "It is detestable," he cried, "and shall never be 
played. The Bastille would first have to be destroyed if the 
piece were to be free from dangerous consequences. The man 
mocks at everything one should respect in a government." " The 
piece shall not be played?" the queen asked. "No, certainly 
not," replied Louis XVI.; "you may depend upon it." But 
Beaumarchais had said, "The piece shall be played;" and it was 
Beaumarchais who won the day. He had the king and keeper of 
the seals against him, but he had the public and a part of the 
court with him. A dexterous and experienced intriguer, he had 



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282 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

awakened public opinion by underhand means, by tiny rumours 
adroitly spread, thanks to the complicity of some and the stupidity 
or vanity of others, and excited curiosity. Every one wished to 
know the work at which the ministers took umbrage ; and if the 
representation were prohibited, it was not forbidden to read it. 
Beaumarchais, while appearing to withdraw, like Virgil's nymph, 
and to refuse out of consideration for the will of the king, was 
enchanted to yield to wishes so vehemently expressed ; he him- 
self read it, and every one sought to obtain the favour of listening 
to him, either in his own house or in the most brilliant salons. 
Neither bishops nor archbishops disdained to appear among 
the audience; eaclf day, Madame Campan relates, we heard, 
** I was present, or I am to be present, at a reading of Beau- 
marchais's piece.'* Being a man who neglected no detail, 
the author had prepared for these sessions an elegant manu- 
script bound with pink favours, on which was written, in large 
characters, *'A Comic Tract** "A singular title,** Monsieur de 
Lom^nie has justly remarked, "for a voluminous comedy in 
five acts, which was a sort of bloodhound used to hunt down 
the old regime.'* But every one was delighted. The great nobles 
were the first to applaud the satire on their manners, — the en- 
gine of war directed not only against their privileges, but against 
their legitimate influence. ** Only petty minds fear petty writings,*' 
Figaro remarks in the piece. No one wished to pass for a petty 
mind. The Baron de Breteuil, the Comte de Vaudreuil, Madame 
de Polignac, were among the partisans of Beaumarchais. The 
Princesse de I^mballe sent the Due de Fronsac to him to request 
the favour of a reading at her house, and the clever comedian 
only consented after much solicitation. When the Comte and 
Comtesse du Nord came to France, they wished to hear ** The 
Marriage of Figaro.** "The piece interests us greatly,'* the Baroness 
von Oberkirche said. Encouraged by all this approbation, Beau- 
marchais wrote to the lieutenant of police to demand again the 
authorization of his work, asserting that he had made great 
changes in it. The lieutenant of police, or rather the keeper of 
the seals, turned a deaf ear; but in June, 1783, the solicitations 
became more pressing, and permission was granted. The actors 
of the Com6die Frangaise received orders to study the piece; and 
the first gentleman of the bedchamber authorized Monsieur de la 
Fert6 to lend the Hotel des Menus-Plaisirs for the representation. 
Tickets were distributed to all the court; carriages already 



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"MARRIAGE OF FIGARO" PRIVATELY PLAYED. 283 

thronged the entrance of the theatre ; the hall was half filled ; 
at the last moment the representation was forbidden by a lettre de 
cachet One can imagine the excitement ** This prohibition of 
the king," Madame Campan said, ** seemed like an attack upon 
public liberty. So many disappointed hopes excited the discon- 
tent to such a point that the words * oppression * and * tyranny ' 
were never pronounced with more vehemence, even during the 
days which preceded the fall of the throne." 

Louis XVI. imagined that he was acting vigorously; he did 
not maintain it, and it was but an act of weakness. He himself 
was mistrustful of his steadfastness. " You will see," he said, 
one day, "that Monsieur Beaumarchais will be more powerful 
than the keeper of the seals." A singular sign of the time, and 
a more singular sign of character, this saying of a sovereign who 
held his own authority and that of his ministers so cheap. More- 
over, he was not mistaken ; three months after this interdiction, 
the piece was given, not yet in public, but before a part of the 
court, and in the presence of the king's brother. It was Monsieur 
de Vaudreuil who, wishing to give a novel and piquant entertain- 
ment at his house at Gennevilliers, had undertaken to obtain the 
revocation of the prohibition. How did he obtain it? We do 
not know; only one thing is certain, and that was the vehemence 
of the desire of that frivolous society. " Without * The Marriage 
of Figaro' there is no safety," Vaudreuil wrote to the Due de 
Fronsac, and the latter despatched a courier with all speed to 
Beaumarchais, who was then in England, in order to satisfy the 
impatience of his friend, "of the ladies," and of the Comte 
d'Artois. 

The breach was made. "The presence of Monseigneur le 
Comte d'Artois and the real merit of your charming piece finally 
destroyed every obstacle that had retarded its representation, 
and consequently its success," Monsieur de Vaudreuil wrote to 
the author. There was no longer question of anything but to 
find an excuse for the production of the piece. The excuse 
was found. The king, assailed by solicitations, replied that there 
were still things which must not remain in the work ; that new 
censors must be nominated ; and that the author would the more 
readily make the excisions, as the piece was long. This was to 
capitulate. The new censors did not deceive tliemselves ; they 
demanded certain unimportant modifications ; and on April 27, 
1784, "The Marriage of Figaro" was played at the Theatre 



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284 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

Frangais. Louis XVI. thought that it would fail; convinced 
that the cuts which had been exacted would destroy all the 
interest, and detract from the spiciness of the piece, he demanded 
of Monsieur de Montesquiou, ** Well, what do you think of the 
success? " " Sire, I hope that the piece will fail." " And I too," 
the king replied. ** Yes." Sophie Arnould said, ** it is a piece to 
fail fifty times running." 

We know which was right, Louis XVL or Madame Arnould. 
" There is only one thing more ridiculous than my piece," Beau- 
marchais himself said, ** and that is its success." Who does not 
know the picture of that first night? All Paris thronged to the 
entrances of the theatre ; the blue ribbons were lost in the crowd, 
and rubbed elbows with the Savoyards; the guards were dis- 
persed, the doors forced, the iron grilles broken, by the efforts of 
the mob ; the audience-hall was crowded ; Monsieur himself was 
there with full equipage ; the parterre and the boxes, aggressive 
or frivolous, greeted with noisy acclamations all those witty and 
cynical tirades, audaciously aimed against the established order 
of things ; and at the back of a grated box, three men, whose 
names personify three of the powers of that time, literature, 
Parliament, and government, — Beaumarchais, the Abb6 Sabat- 
tier, the Abb6 de Calonne, — assembled after a gay dinner to 
enjoy together the success which had been so long expected, or 
rather to assist gayly at that tumult which was but the prelude 
and image of the assault directed against the monarchy. 

What part had the queen taken in this affair? It is difficult to 
know exactly. Madame Campan asserts that she showed her 
displeasure against all the persons who had aided the author of 
** The Marriage of Figaro " to surprise the king's consent to the 
production of his comedy. On the other hand, the latest histo- 
rian of Beaumarchais, Monsieur de Lom^nie, quotes a letter from 
the Due de Fronsac to' Papillon de la Fert6, which contains this 
phrase, " The queen said to me that the king had consented to 
allow * The Marriage of Figaro * to be played at Gennevilliers." 
Was Marie Antoinette simply charged to repeat the king's word 
to Messieurs de Fronsac and de Vaudreuil? Had she been her 
brother-in-law's and her friend's advocate with her husband? 
Monsieur de Lom6nie inclines toward the latter hypothesis, and 
therefore contradicts Madame Campan. It seems to us that the 
two opinions are not entirely irreconcilable. It may be, although 
it is by no means proved, that yielding to the importunities of 



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SHE PLAYS IN "THE BARBER OF SEVILLE." 285 

her set, the queen aided Monsieur de Vaudreuil to obtain from 
Louis XVI. the permission which he solicited. But it is highly 
probable also that she believed, as Madame Campan affirms, that 
Beaumarchais had made great changes in his work, as he boasted 
in his letter to the lieutenant of police ; that it was with this idea, 
and to recompense the sacrifices which the author had made, 
that she supported the request which Monsieur de Vaudreuil 
made on that very pretext, and that afterward, being disillusioned 
as to the excisions which had been made, she had not concealed 
her anger against those who had thus lent themselves to deceive 
her and to deceive the king. What is certain, in any case, is that 
she was not present at the representation at Gennevilliers, and 
that she did not again appear in any way in the negotiations 
which followed to obtain permission for a public representation, 
for which Louis XVI., as we have said, exacted the examination 
of two new censors. 

But the queen was a woman ; she was impulsive ; she soon, 
even too soon, forgot offences. The king, in a moment of anger, 
provoked, it is said, by a complaint of Monsieur, had sent Beau- 
marchais, not to the Bastille, but what was more humiliating, to 
St. Lazare. The queen, as well as the public, and the king 
himself when he was calmer, saw an injustice therein. She 
wished to repair it delicately; she undertook herself to play in 
her little theatre at Trianon, not " The Marriage of Figaro," but 
" The Barber of Seville," and invited the author to be present, 
which was an unusual distinction. The rehearsals were held under 
the direction of Dazincourt, who had just made a brilliant success 
in "The Marriage of Figaro." The performance took place on 
Aug. 19, 1785. The queen played Rosine; she loved those r61es 
of a young woman who was half naive, half cunning, innocent 
and coquettish at the same time. The Comte d'Artois played 
Figaro; Monsieur de Vaudreuil, Almaviva; the Due de Guiche, 
Bartholo ; the Bailiff of Crussol, Basile. It was given very pri- 
vately; according to Grimm, it was a success. The small num- 
ber of spectators admitted to the representation, he wrote, were 
agreed that the ensemble was such as one rarely sees in pieces 
played by amateur actors. " One remarked especially that the 
queen displayed, in the scene of the fourth act, an amount of 
grace and truthfulness which could not have failed to call forth 
transports of applause, even for the most obscure actress. We 
have these details," he added, *' from a severe and delicate judge, 
whom no court prejudice has ever blinded in any way." 

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286 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

It was a triumph for the artist, an imprudence for the sov- 
ereign. However small the number of the spectators, the 
rumour of such a representation soon spread beyond the narrow 
circle wherein it should have been confined. And it must have 
seemed strange that a prince of the blood should hurl — no 
matter with what talent — from the private stage of the queen 
those vehement ironies of Figaro, which were only, under a 
gayer form, the eternal and endless protest of all that is little 
against all that is great. Was this but a heedless fancy on Marie 
Antoinette's part, — a thirst of pleasure, the vanity of an artist, 
or the simple wilfulness of a woman? 

We believe that there was something more and better than this. 
Perhaps that enterprise, born in a thought of kindness and of 
reparation — such was the opinion of Grimm — for an author who 
had been injuriously treated, and seconded by the attraction of 
a favourite amusement, may have been carried to the end by a 
delicate sentiment of respect for herself. Perhaps the queen 
feared that if she gave up a plan which had already been pre- 
pared and announced, she would seem to be more touched than 
was compatible with her honour and dignity by the serious oc- 
currence which had thrown Paris into excitement, and which 
popular malice was ready to use against her. Four days before, 
indeed, a thunderbolt had fallen from the sky of Versailles, where 
for some time so many clouds had been gathering. 

They were in the midst of the lawsuit over the necklace. 



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CHAPTER XX. 

Lawsuit op the Necku^ce. 

AN intriguing woman, a forger, and a dupe, — such were the 
principal authors, such, in three words, is the summary of 
the strange drama, or rather of the immense swindle, which bears 
in history the name of the lawsuit of the necklace. 

The intriguing woman was the Comtesse de la Motte-Valois; 
the forger, Retaux de Villette; the dupe, Prince Louis de Rohan, 
archbishop of Strasburg, grand almoner of France and cardinal ; 
the true victim, the queen. It was not the first time that rogues 
had abused the name of Marie Antoinette. In 1777 the wife of 
a treasurer of France, named Cahouet de Villiers, who had been 
formerly mixed up in the intrigues which had brought Madame du 
Barry to court, had set the example, and, in a manner, marked out 
the way for Madame de la Motte. Intimately connected with an 
intendant of the queen's finances. Monsieur de Saint-Charles, she 
had succeeded through his aid in procuring a register with Marie 
Antoinette's arms, and some royal orders, signed in advance; 
then by cleverly counterfeiting the royal handwriting, she had 
forged false letters, wherein the young princess in the most 
familiar and affectionate style had begged her to make the ac- 
quisition of various objects for her. These notes and the register, 
shown with a certain mystery, intimations dexterously insinuated 
of pretended audiences obtained at Versailles, had accredited 
the opinion that Madame de Villiefs verily enjoyed the august 
confidence. Then pushing her audacity further, she forged new 
letters, wherein the queen charged her to procure relatively large 
sums, of which, she said, she stood in pressing need, and which 
she dared not demand from the king. Duped by this supposed 
credit, and anxious to oblige their sovereign, the treasurer of the 
Due d'Orl^ans, Berenger, and a banker named De Lafosse gave 
to the woman, the first one hundred thousand ^cus, the second 
one hundred thousand francs. 



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288 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

But Berenger had his doubts ; he communicated them to Mon- 
sieur de Sartines. The fraud was discovered, and Madame de 
Villiers was arrested. Mercy wished that information of this 
shady transaction should be sent to an ordinary justice. ** Every- 
thing that touches the glory of the queen," he said, " should be set 
forth in the clearest light" But the Comte de Maurepas was op- 
posed to a public trial. Was he afraid of the extent of the scan- 
dal ? Did he fear, as some persons insinuated, that his nephew, 
D'Aiguillon, was implicated in the affair? However that may 
be, a special commission was called for the trial. Monsieur de 
Villiers, though not personally held responsible, was condemned 
to repay the stolen sums, and was ruined by the restitution ; his 
wife was imprisoned at St. Pelagic, and the affair, after having 
created a little noise, was soon forgotten. But however bold that 
enterprise may have been, what was the miserable theft of four 
hundred thousand francs by the side of the gigantic undertaking 
planned and executed by Madame de la Motte? 

Jeanne de Sainte-R6my-Valois, Comtesse de la Motte, was de- 
scended from a baron of Sainte-R6my, the natural son of Henri II. 
Her father, the last representative of this branch of royal origin 
and former proprietors of the important domains of Essoye, 
Fontette, and Vazelle, but whose family had for a long time been 
reduced to poverty, had finally lived by hunting and highway 
robbery, and had died in the hospital ; her mother had followed 
a soldier. Left 'without resources, with a brother and sister 
younger than herself, Mademoiselle de Sainte-R^my had first sub- 
sisted on public charity. The cur6 of her parish, moved with 
compassion for the sad remnants of a royal race, had recom- 
mended them to the bishop of Langres, Monseigneur de la 
Luzerne, and to the Marquise de Boulainvilliers, the wife of the 
provost of Paris, who lived in the suburbs of Fontette. The 
prelate and the great lady took an interest in the children, placed 
the son in an educational institution at Bar-sur-Seine, and the 
daughters in a school at Passy, where Madame de Boulainvilliers 
took them under her protection. 

** Thus the last descendants of the Valois passed from an almost 
savage state to a civilized condition," wrote the Comte Beugnot, 
who had known them well. 

Six years later Jeanne de Sainte-R6my left the school at Passy, 
and was placed with a mistress to learn the trade of a dressmaker, 
with whom she remained three years. 



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MARRIAGE OF JEANNE DE SAINTE-RfiMY. 289 

Monseigneur de la Luzerne had sent the orphans' papers to 
Ch^rin. Ch6rin verified their genealogy, and acknowledged its 
authenticity; and on a certificate made out by him, the king 
granted to the son of the Baron de Valois a pension of eight hun- 
dred francs, and free admission to the navy, where he conducted 
himself well, and rose to the rank of lieutenant; to each of the 
girls was given a pension equal to that of their brother, for their 
subsistence, and at the end of two years, to be passed at the house 
of Madame de Boulainvilliers, a place in the abbey of Yerres, 
near Montgeron, then in the abbey of Longchamps. These 
gifts were made in the secret hope that the son would take vows 
in the order of Malta, and that the daughters, once in the con- 
vent, would never leave it. 

But such was not Mademoiselle de Valois's intention; she had 
no taste for a religious life. One fine morning the two sisters 
escaped from Longchamps, and after an eventful journey landed 
at Bar-sur-Aube, in the inn of the T^te Rouge, with six francs in 
their pockets. A lady, Madame de Surmont, moved with pity, 
received them in her house, and put them for the moment beyond 
reach of want. 

Jeanne de Sainte-R^my, without being exactly beautiful, had 
that piquant grace which is often more attractive than beauty. 
Her figure was of medium height, but slender and well-formed ; 
her mouth was large, but was furnished with good teeth ; her eyes 
blue, hidden beneath black eyelashes ; her hand well n\ade ; her 
foot very small ; her complexion of remarkable whiteness ; her 
smile enchanting. With no education, but of a lively and pene- 
trating mind, of a bold and enterprising character, affecting at 
need timidity and gentleness, but resolute in pursuing her end, 
without principles to bother her, sh« was tenacious of pleasing, 
and she pleased. A nephew of Madame de Surmont, the Comte 
de la Motte, who was serving in the gendarmerie^ was then on his 
vacation with his family ; at the end of a few months, on June 6, 
1780, a forced marriage made him the husband of a descendant 
of Henri H. He brought to his wife a fine name, an expression 
of face which was exceedingly amiable, despite his ugliness, many 
debts, and few scruples, great dexterity in bodily exercise, and a 
mind inclined to adventure. 

It was necessary to live, and they only had a pension of eight hun- 
dred livres. Madame de Surmont had turned the young couple out 
of her house. A sister of Madame de la Motte, Madame de Latour, 
VOL. I. — 19 

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290 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

to whose house they went during^ their first perplexity, " having 
herself somewhat less than was necessary to keep her, was not long 
able to maintain them." The husband rejoined his regiment at 
Lun^ville and at Nancy. But poverty overtook them ; they re- 
solved to fall back upon Ch^rin's certificate, and the memory of 
the Valois. They had recourse to Madame de Boulainvilliers, 
who, ever kindly disposed toward her protegee, presented her in 
the month of September, 1 781, to the grand almoner of France, 
Cardinal de Rohan, who was at that time at his chateau of 
Saverne. 

This was the first step ; but Madame de la Motte aimed at more. 
In the month of November of the same year Monsieur de la Motte 
handed in his resignation, and the two set out for Paris, — that 
great refuge for all plotters and d^classh. Misfortune there pursued 
them ; they had scarcely arrived before their protectress, Madame 
de Boulainvilliers, died of small-pox. Madame de la Motte, how- 
ever, was not discouraged ; she and her husband installed them- 
selves in a miserable lodging-house in the Rue de la Verrerie, — 
the H6tel de Rheims, — where they lived by expedients, and suf- 
fered many privations. She multiplied her efforts : she obtained 
for Monsieur de la Motte a place as supernumerary in the Light 
Guards of Monsieur d*Artois, had an audience with the Mar6chal 
de Richelieu, betook herself to Versailles, and there engaged a 
furnished room; she penetrated even to the waiting-room of 
Madame, where she feigned to fall in a faint, and received from 
the princess, who was moved with pity, a few louis; she appealed 
to every one, — to Monsieur d'Ormesson, to Monsieur de Calonne, 
to the Duchesse d'Orldans, — and obtained a few small sums, alms 
rather than presents; she failed with the Comtesse d*Artois, but, 
despite her failures, still dreamed of even reaching the queen ; in 
the mean while she went to Luciennes, to solicit from Madame du 
Barry a position as companion, or at least that she should hand 
a petition to the king; then finally, over\vhelmed with debts, and 
receiving but vague promises or meagre succour, not knowing to 
what saint to pray, she turned to the nobleman to whom her pro- 
tectress had recommended her, and in the month of June, 1782, 
requested an audience of the Cardinal de Rohan. She saw him, 
pleased him, moved him by the picture she drew of her misery, 
returned to see him. With her keen and penetrating mind, she 
soon took his measure, and feeling that she had found in that 
vain, prodigal, and libertine prelate a mine which was as abun- 



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THE CARDINAL DE ROHAN. 291 

dant as it was easy, attached herself to him, and did not leave him 
again. 

Louis Ren^ Edouard, Prince and Cardinal de Rohan, grand al- 
moner of France, was then only coadjutor of his uncle, the bishop 
of Strasburg, and was known under the name of Prince Louis. 
He had been nominated in 1771 ambassador to Vienna, thanks 
to the influence of two members of his powerful house, — the 
Comtesse de Marsan and the Prince de Soubise. A sufficiently 
bad reputation had preceded him, and Maria Theresa was tempted 
for a moment to refuse to receive ** that wicked fellow," ** who 
was more of a soldier than a coadjutor," as the queen said. 
Light-minded, inconstant, of a character inclined to intrigue, lib- 
eral and magnificent even to prodigality, without judgment or 
principle, but with a noble mien, the attractive exterior of a man of 
the world, and the fine manners of a man of race, the Prince de 
Rohan was at the same time the idol of women, and a subject of 
scandal for serious people. His conduct in Austria did not belie 
the opinion which had been formed of him. He sought at first to 
conciliate the good graces of the empress by affecting an almost 
puritanical reserve; but the constraint which he imposed upon 
himself did not last, and at the end of two months Maria Theresa 
wrote, — 

" I cannot give my approbation to the ambassador, Rohan ; he is a big 
volume, stuffed full of evil remarks, ill suited to his position as ecclesi- 
astic and minister, which he scatters abroad impudently on every occasion ; 
without knowledge of affairs or sufficient understanding ; with a fund of 
levity, presumption, and inconsequence. One cannot rely either upon his 
explanations or his reports. The majority of his following is the same, 
without merit and without manners. I do not say this to you with the 
intent of having you demand his recall, but if his court should recall him 
of its own accord, I should be very well content." 

During two years there were the same complaints against ** this 
wicked fantastic, full of extravagances and folly," who respected 
nothing, not even his holy calling, and who himself cynically 
spoke of his priesthood. The behaviour of the persons con- 
nected with the embassy was not more orderly than that of the 
ambassador; valets and master were in accord. 

While the former maltreated the secretaries of the court, 
knocked the sentinels of the palace beneath their horses* hoofs, 
struck the peasants of the surrounding country with their whips, 
got beaten in th«ir turn, and by their perpetual provocations 



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292 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

aroused all the old national prejudices against the French, the 
latter used his privileges as ambassador to carry on smuggling, 
which did not prevent his being overwhelmed with^ debts, not- 
withstanding his great fortune and rich abbeys, traversed in a 
hunting-costume a Corpus Christi procession, braved opinion, 
set the empress at defiance, forged letters from Maria Theresa, 
flooded the court of Versailles, the salons of Paris, even those of 
Vienna, with wicked and scandalous stories against the mother 
and daughter, and succeeded in exciting the ill-humour of the 
emperor against the dauphiness. His secretary, the Abb^ 
Georgel, a former Jesuit, a designing and vindictive man, aided 
him well in his work of propagating calumny and forging letters. 

Things came to such a pass that Maria Theresa feared the 
rancour of Prince Louis for her daughter ; and the ardour with 
which she desired his departure even left her indifferent as to 
who his successor might be. On the other hand, society in 
Vienna did not conceal its sympathy for a personage whose 
large expenditures, lavish hospitality, and gallant manners 
dazzled them. All the women, young or old, beautiful or ugly, 
were infatuated with him. Joseph II. himself, although he de- 
spised him. found his "gossip and conundrums" amusing; and 
Kaunitz, more solicitous for the interests of politics than of 
morals, was very well content with a minister whose levity " did 
not disturb him." 

The assertion has been made that the Prince de Rohan was a 
victim to Austria's resentment, and was sacrificed by Marie An- 
toinette because he had discovered the imperial policy. The 
reply to this assertion of certain historians is to be found in this 
phrase of Maria Theresa: "The ambassador Rohan is always 
the same : the emperor and Kaunitz like him well enough ; the 
one amuses himself by making him talk nonsense, the other is 
content with his lack of capacity." The truth is that the future 
hero of the lawsuit over the queen's necklace was no better 
diplomat than he was an orderly prelate, and that Marie An- 
toinette, in manifesting toward him under all circumstances an 
invincible antipathy, was not paying off old family grudges, but 
was only yielding to the natural repugnance of an upright mind 
for a priest so little worthy of his calling. The Due d'Aiguillon 
himself valued his agent at his proper worth; and if Prince Louis 
kept a post which he filled so badly, it was owing to the same 
causes which had placed him there, — to family influence, and to 



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DE ROHAN IS MADE CARDINAL. 293 

the intrigues of the Prince de Soubise and of the Comtesse de 
Marsan. 

His favour diminished on the accession of Louis XVI. ; and 
one of the first acts of the new sovereign was to recall the 
ambassador who, the queen said, " dishonoured France more 
than he scandalized Austria." The ladies of Vienna were in 
despair, and only consoled themselves by wearing the picture of 
their favourite mounted in a ring. 

Joseph II. and Kaunitz had their reasons for regret. Certain 
steps were taken at Versailles with the view of obtaining for him 
a continuance in the office of ambassador, or at least some deci- 
sive mark of favour. The king was inflexible: he refused to 
receive the Prince de Rohan; the queen would not speak to 
him. A pension of fifty thousand livres to pay his debts, until 
he. should come into possession of his bishopric of Strasburg, 
was the only indemnity he received for his disgrace. But the 
Rohans were not discouraged ; their ambition, ever on the alert 
for the advancement of him on whom, they thought, rested 
the best chances for their house, lost no means of influence. 
The Prince de Soubise, the Princesse de Gu^m6n6e, her daughter, 
then high in favour with the queen, especially the Comtesse de * 
Marsan, who was the soul of all these intrigues, and who, despite 
the diminution of her favour, always preserved in the eyes of 
Louis XVI. the prestige of her former office as governess to 
the Children of France, united their efforts, either in France or 
abroad, to heap upon the head of Prince Louis every dignity 
and honour. 

Success crowned so much perseverance ; the king of Poland, 
'* a worthy protector of such a prot^g6," as Maria Theresa said, 
obtained, in default of the king of France, who refused to make 
the demand, a cardinal's hat for the coadjutor of Strasburg. 
The Sorbonne made him its head-master on Jan. 31, 1782, al- 
though he was not, to use the language of that time, ** of the 
house," and was accused of many scandals in his youth, and of 
being scarcely orthodox in his doctrine; and Louis XVI. him- 
self, tormented -by his former governess, bound, moreover, by 
a written promise of his grandfather, was persuaded in a mo- 
ment of weakness to assure the reversion of the office of grand 
almoner to the prince. 

The queen had striven in vain with her husband to annul or 
defeat the effect of this imprudent promise; in vain she had 



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294 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

made him give her his word that the coadjutor of Strasburg 
should never be grand almoner of France. On the day following 
the death of the titulary of that post, the Cardinal de la Roche- 
Aymon and the Comtesse de Marsan, warned by Maurepas, went 
to the king on his awakening, and despite his evasions and reluc- 
tance wrung from him the nomination of Prince Louis to the 
office which had been vacant but a few hours, with this illusory 
condition, that he should hand in his resignation at the end of 
a year. This was the compromise which the feeble Louis XVL 
conceived in order to keep his promise to the Rohans without 
breaking his word to the queen. 

The desires of the ambitious governess were satisfied : her 
favburite was grand almoner, a member of the Academic Fran- 
^aise, head-master of the Sorbonne, superior-general of the 
Hospital of Eighty, commander of the order of the St. Esprit, 
while waiting to be bishop of Strasburg, abb^ of St. Waast, of La 
Chaise Dieu, of Marmoutiers, the possessor of eight hundred 
thousand livres of income from his benefices; if it were only 
possible, this would indeed crown her dreams, — to make him 
prime minister! 

** I look upon it as a very great misfortune that the Prince de 
Rohan should occupy the position of grand almoner,*' Mercy 
said ; ** his audacity and intriguing may become very dangerous 
to the queen." And Maria Theresa on her part wrote to her 
daughter, — 

** The place that Rohan is to occupy distresses me ; he is a cruel enemy, 
as much on your account as because of his own principles, which are most 
perverse. Under an affable, easy, courteous behaviour, he did much harm 
at Vienna ; and I must see him by the side of the king and of you. He 
will scarce be an honour to his station as bishop." 

The forebodings of Mercy and Maria Theresa were not mis- 
taken ; but it was less the audacity of the prince than his vanity 
that became dangerous. The cardinal, treated by Marie Antoi- 
nette with marked coldness, received with ill favour when he went 
to make the customary acknowledgments, irritated, humiliated, 
wounded in his amour-propre as a great noble, his ambition as a 
courtier alarmed, — for he felt that the queen's credit was daily 
waxing greater, and that to have her for an enemy was to con- 
demn himself to impotence, — the cardinal, while his friends did 
not cease their campaign of secret machinations, of spiteful re- 



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HER DISLIKE FOR DE ROHAN. 295 

marks, of anonymous attacks, himself made every possible effort, 
wrote letter upon letter, to gain the good-will of, and procure a 
favourable reception from, the young sovereign. He only suc- 
ceeded in being importunate without inducing her to change her 
mind with regard to him. 

The futility of his endeavours did not discourage him ; and his 
blind desire, irritated by failure, made him capable of every 
extravagance. If we may believe Madame Campan, he had al- 
ready allowed himself to be duped by a woman named Goupil, — 
a consummate intrigante^ who had escaped from Salpetri^re, 
and who had made him believe that she could reconcile him and 
the queen. Later, when Marie Antoinette gave a supper and 
entertainment to the Comte and Comtesse du Nord at Trianon, 
the cardinal had the presumptuous fancy to introduce himself 
into the garden. Not daring to ask permission of the queen, who 
would have refused it, he persuaded the concierge to allow him 
to enter, by promising him to remain in his lodge; but he did not 
keep his promise, and twice placed himself in the way of the 
royal family, when, despite the redingote which he had donned 
to disguise himself, his red stockings betrayed him. The queen, 
indignant at the audacity of the prelate and the compliance of 
the concierge, had, on the following day, dismissed the latter; 
and the pressing solicitations of Madame Campan, who was 
touched by the distress of a father of a family, had been neces- 
sary to reinstate the faithless servant in his position. But if the 
sovereign consented to pardon the suborned, she neglected no 
occasion to manifest her indignation and contempt for the sub- 
orner. She was not only inflexible, she was inaccessible. Despite 
the exertions of his family, despite his own efforts, the unfortu- 
nate cardinal could not obtain a word or a look from her. All the 
memorials of the time, and the documents of the trial, attest this ; 
never, we believe, was an historical fact better established than 
the profound, deliberate, and persistent antipathy of Marie 
Antoinette for the Prince de Rohan, and at the same time, the 
immoderate desire of the latter to overcome a coldness so preju- 
dicial to his ambition, so mortifying to his vanity. 

Things were at this pass, and the cardinal was still sore after 
his recent escapade at Trianon, when on June 24, 1782, he 
entered into relations with Madame de la Motte. How impor- 
tant was the aid granted by the grand almoner to the descendant 
of the Valois? Was it limited to a few louis, granted from time 



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296 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

to time, as the cardinal asserted, or did it reach the considerable 

sum of eighty thousand livres, as Madame de la Motte affirmed? 

Despite the mystery which surrounds this point, the situation 

of the La Mottes, which was so long precarious, their expedients, 

— such as pawning their effects, the sale of their pension, loans, 
etc., that very mixture of outward magnificence and real distress 
which is the luxury and sign of the needy, — would seem to 
confirm the cardinal's assertion. But at the same time it appears 
not less certain that during two years the interviews of Madame 
de la Motte with the bishop of Strasburg were tolerably frequent, 

— more frequent than the prince was willing later to acknowl- 
edge. Touched by the unfortunate situation of the woman, 
charmed by her wit, captivated by her grace, ensnared by her 
cleverness, he was not long in submitting to her charm, and 
showing it. As early as 1783 he became her surety for a sum of 
five thousand five hundred livres, borrowed from a Jew of Nancy ; 
he recommended her to the comptroller-general, gave her advice 
on the composition of the memorials which she presented to the 
king and to the ministers, received her at Strasburg, listened to 
her confidences, and probably made her his own. 

At the end of two years, the interest which the grand almoner 
took In Madame de la Motte, and his confidence in her, were 
sufficiently established for her to dare, one fine day, to tell him 
the following story : — 

She had finally reached, or at least very nearly reached, her 
aim. Thanks to favour from a high quarter, the estates, the 
fortune, and the rank of her family were about to be restored to 
her ; and the protectress who patronized her was no other than 
the queen. This princess, touched by the undeserved distress of 
the granddaughter of Henri II., could not suffer one of the 
Valois to be reduced to so precarious a position. She would 
support the last of the race; she would do more, she would 
honour them with her friendship, and grant them her confidence, 
and did not disdain, in the secret interviews which she had with 
Madame de la Motte, to charge her with the most delicate 
commissions. 

Nothing was true in this recital ; and eighteen months later, 
Marie Antoinette could affirm openly that this low adventuress 
had never had any position at Versailles, nor access to her 
Madame de la Motte herself, in her examination of Jan. 20, 1786, 
was constrained to avow that she had never had occasion or pre- 



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DE ROHAN DUPED BY MADAME DE LA MOTTE. 297 

text to speak to the queen. Once only, on Feb. 2, 1783, she had 
presented a petition to her; Marie Antoinette had passed on 
without paying any attention to the petitioner, and had preserved 
no memory of the person. Alone of the royal family, Madame 
for an instant had interested herself in the granddaughter of the 
Valois, and had had her pension of eight hundred livres increased 
to fifteen hundred. But at this point the relations of Madame de 
la Motte with Versailles had ceased. The cardinal could not have 
been ignorant of this; and.although he averred that his disgrace 
placed him beyond the power of knowing these details, the in- 
fluence of the Rohans was sufficiently great, and their relations 
with the court sufficiently frequent, for him to have been able to 
verify the facts if he had desired. But he does not seem to have 
thought of it seriously. Fascinated by Madame de la Motte, he 
believed all she told him. To accomplish his captivation, she 
showed him, with every appearance of mystery, which redoubled 
the importance of the communication, some letters which she 
pretended had been written by the queen; she committed 
forgery to accredit her lies. These letters contained words of 
kindness addressed to her, some familiar and affectionate expres- 
sions, — ** My dear countess," " my dear heart." The cardinal 
might have verified the handwriting; he did not take the 
trouble to do so. 

From a petitioner, the clever woman posed as his protectress ; 
grateful for Monsieur de Rohan's kindness, she was ready to 
employ for his benefit the favour which the kindness of Marie 
Antoinette assured to her. Still more, she had already begun; 
and the way in which her first overtures had been received, gave 
her reason to cherish very great hopes of ultimate success. She 
had nothing to do but to finish a work so well under way, and 
she could not fail. 

We easily believe what we desire. The cardinal was delighted. 
To regain the good-will of the queen was his dearest dream. 
How could he doubt the word of a woman who was ready to 
render him such a service, — of a woman, moreover, it must be 
said, to whom he had never done anything but good? As a 
consummate plotter, Madame de la Motte took care to keep the 
credulous prelate ever on the alert. "The prejudices of the 
queen were little by little being overcome; her severity was 
diminishing; she would even consent to have Monsieur de 
Rohan lay his justification before her in writing." The cardinal 



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298 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

immediately hastened to draw up a memorial, wherein he stated 
everything that was likely to dissipate the displeasure of his 
sovereign. The memorial was confided to Madame de la Motte ; 
and a few days after, the adventuress brought a pretended reply 
from the queen, thus worded : ** I have read your letter ; I am 
charmed to find you no longer culpable. I cannot yet grant you 
the audience you desire. When circumstances permit, I shall let 
you know. Be discreet." 

The cardinal was in transports ; he sent a few lines in reply to 
this note, wherein he lost himself in thanks. And from this 
there was established between him and Marie Antoinette, by the 
intermediation of the countess, a supposed correspondence, which 
completed the deception of the unfortunate prelate, — a corre- 
spondence filled, on the part of the cardinal, with exaggerated 
gratitude, of which nothing can give any idea, and at the same 
time with the most incredible dreams of ambition ; while the letters 
of the queen expressed sentiments of interest and of confidence. 
These pretended letters, written on small blue paper, with gilt 
edges and vignettes, were simply fabricated under the direction of 
Madame de la Motte by a friend of her husband, who had soon 
become hers, and even something more, under the name of her 
secretary, — Retaux de Villette, a iormtr gendarme ^ burdened with 
debts, accustomed to live by expedients, like the De la Mottes, 
and like them not very delicate as to the choice of expedients ; of 
a quick and insinuating mind ; a good fellow, moreover, who had 
a certain smattering of art and literature, and who threw himself 
with sufficient thoughtlessness into this affair; for he did not 
even take care to disguise his own handwriting, or to imitate 
that of .the queen. But the cardinal did not examine too closely. 
Absorbed by his hopes, he saw nothing. 

Only one thing was lacking. The cardinal desired to have a 
verbal assurance of that pardon which had been given to him 
by letter ; he was eager to receive it from the mouth of his sov- 
ereign. When would that audience which had been promised 
him take place? Madame de la Motte, embarrassed, hesi- 
tated, deferred, evaded; but the prelate became pressing, and 
the countess, pushed to extremities, at length announced that 
the queen consented to see the grand almoner. However, as it 
was not fitting for her to give a conspicuous sign of her change 
of conduct, which could not fail to create a good deal of talk at 
court, she would speak to him, not in public, but in the evening 



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MADEMOISELLE D'OLIVA. 299 

in the gardens of Versailles. The blinded prelate believed all ; 
a celebrated charlatan, who was one of his intimates, and in 
whom he had absolute confidence, — Cagliostro, — had predicted 
to him that this happy correspondence would place him at the 
pinnacle of his fortunes, and that his influence in the government 
would become preponderant. After this day, the cardinal, eager, 
anxious, so happy that he sometimes asked if he were not the 
puppet of a dream, with attentive ear, and eye ever on the alert, — 
the cardinal, dressed in a long blue coat and a large hat, walked 
in the park of the chateau, accompanied by one of the gentle- 
men of his household, the Baron *de Planta, awaiting the blessed 
instant which should decide his fortune and crown his hopes. 

One evening, the 24th of July, at eleven o'clock, Madame de 
la Motte came to him. ** Quick 1 " she said ; ** the queen permits 
you to approach her! " He ran; he flew; he hastened his steps, 
although somewhat stealthily; he arrived in the avenue, near 
which was a hedge ; he perceived a woman dressed in white, who 
held out a rose to him, and murmured these words, ** You know 
what this means." Then suddenly a man appeared, ** Here come 
Madame and Madame la Comtesse d*Artois," he said in a whis- 
per. ** Quick, quick ! *' Madame de la Motte cried. The woman 
quickly disappeared in the hedge; and the cardinal withdrew, 
convinced that he had seen the queen, and dreaming of the most 
brilliant destiny. The interview had lasted only a moment; but 
that moment had well recompensed all his trouble. What had 
really occurred? What was the meaning of the scene, and who 
was the woman? 

During the first days of July, Monsieur de la Motte had met 
at the Palais Royal a young woman whose resemblance to the 
queen had struck him. This was a girl named Le Guay, a///^ 
du monde, as one said then, — a " street-walker," as Marie Antoi- 
nette wrote somewhat later, known in the equivocal society in 
which she lived as Mademoiselle d'Oliva. La Motte had followed 
her to her domicile and struck up an acquaintance with her. 
Seven or eight days later he informed her that a lady of very great 
distinction wished to see her, and that he would fetch her that 
very evening. That evening, in fact, the lady in question, who 
was no other than Madame de la Motte, came in her turn. " My 
dear heart," she said to her, ** you do not know me ; but have 
confidence in what I am going to tell you. I am a lady attached 
to the court." And she added, *' I am hand in glove with the 



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300 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

queen ; she has placed great confidence in me, and has charged 
me to find her some one who will be disposed to do something 
for her when the time comes. I have cast my eyes on you. If 
you will consent, I will make you a present of fifteen thousand 
francs, and the queen's gift will be worth as much more." As 
proof in support of what she said, she exhibited the famous 
forged letter which had already seduced and conquered the Car- 
dinal de Rohan. Surprised at a proposition of such a nature, 
but dazzled by the name of the queen, and the prospect of a 
protection of which she had never dreamed, Mademoiselle d'Oliva 
accepted. It was agreed that on the following day Monsieur de 
la Motte should call for her in a carriage and take her to Ver- 
sailles. This was done ; at the hour fixed, Monsieur de la Motte 
went in search of his new friend, in company with his colleague, 
Retaux de Villette, and the three set out for Versailles. Madame 
de la Motte had preceded them, with her waiting-woman, Rosalie 
Briffaut. They alighted in the Place Dauphine, at the Hotel 
de la Belle Image, the habitual residence of the countess. 

The two plotters feigned to go out for a moment ; then they 
returned and announced to Mademoiselle d'Oliva that the queen 
was entirely satisfied, and was awaiting with impatience the 
following day. 

** What shall I have to do then?'* Mademoiselle d'Oliva asked. 

**You shall know to-morrow,** Madame de la Motte replied 
mysteriously. 

The following day was in fact the day fixed for the scene 
which we have just described. When evening came, they pro- 
ceeded to the toilet of the principal actress. Madame de la 
Motte did not disdain to preside over it in person. Aided by 
her waiting-woman, she attired Mademoiselle d'Oliva, who had 
become for the moment the Baronne d'Oliva, in a white chemise 
with a pink lining, threw over her shoulders a white mantle, 
dressed her hair with a Thirkse, then gave her a letter, and said, 
** I shall conduct you this evening to the park. A very great 
noble will approach you ; you must give him this letter and this 
rose, and say to him, ' You know what this means.' This is all 
that you will have to do.'* 

The affair passed as had been agreed upon, and as we have 
related. The great noble, it is superfluous to say, was no other 
than the Cardinal de Rohan. Agitated by the unexpected rdle 
she had to play. Mademoiselle d'Oliva forgot indeed to give him 



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THE PROSPERITY OF THE LA MOTTES. 30' 

the letter. But the cardinal did not need it ; he had received the 
rose ; he had heard from the mouth of her whom he took to be 
the queen the words which seemed to him the guarantee of his 
pardon. He was not only confident and credulous, he was 
blind. His gratitude to Madame de la Motte knew no bounds; 
his faith in her was not to be shaken. 

" An ardent ambition," the Comte Beugnot has said, " was joined in 
him with a very tender affection. Each of these two sentiments exalted 
the . other, and the unfortunate man was possessed by a sort of delirium* 
I have been able to read hastily some of the letters which he then wrote 
to Madame de la Motte. They were all fire. The shock, or rather the 
movement, of the two passions was frightful." 

The time for work was over. Madame de la Motte had only 
to reap the reward of her labour, and she was not in a humour to 
wait long. At the end of August, a letter fabricated by Retaux 
asked the cardinal for the sum of sixty thousand livres, for some 
persons in whom the queen was interested. The prelate had no 
instant of doubt or hesitation. Every desire of the queen was 
a command for him. The Baron de Planta carried the sum 
named to Madame de la Motte, who, in this case as in all the 
others, was the intermediary between Monsieur de Rohan and 
Marie Antoinette. Of these sixty thousand francs, four thousand, 
instead of the fifteen thousand promised, were given to Ma- 
demoiselle d'Oliva, who continued to understand nothing of the 
part which she had been made to play, and who after a time was 
completely set aside ; the rest went to meet the expenses of the 
household of the La Mottes. 

Three months later, in November, came a new letter, like the 
preceding from the hands of Retaux, and a new request, not for 
sixty, but for a hundred thousand francs ! As at first, the car- 
dinal paid without counting. The hundred thousand francs were 
remitted by the Baron de Planta. As before, the sum passed to 
the account of the La Mottes, and went to appease their cred- 
itors or to support their prodigalities. 

Their household was ordered on a magnificent scale. They 
hired three new domestics; they bought a carriage, horses, 
clocks, bracelets, diamonds, gems of all sorts, a magnificent 
service of plate. They no longer borrowed ; they lent. And in 
order the better to emphasize their metamorphosis, Monsieur 
and Madame de la Motte betook themselves to Bar-sur-Aube in 



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302 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

great style ; such was their hurry to reappear in all the magnifi- 
cence of their fortune before the eyes of those who had formerly 
known them in their poverty. A van preceded them ; two cou- 
riers announced them ; a butler, with a grand air, ordered the 
most expensive provisions for their dinner. After these prepa- 
rations, which excited the curiosity of the inhabitants of the vil- 
lage, the couple themselves made their entrance in an elegant 
berlin. A brother-in-law of Monsieur de la Motte, Monsieur de 
la Tour, whom an ill-concealed antipathy rendered more clear- 
sighted, alone suspected the truth, and qualified his brother-in- 
law as a fool and his sister-in-law as a rogue. 

However, the rumour of the influence of Madame de la Motte 
spread on all sides : it was talked of at Paris ; it was talked of at 
Versailles. She herself, by a clever reserve, by exhibition of the 
pretended royal letters, always written by Retaux on the famous 
blue paper with vignettes, carefully cultivated the report; and 
the great style which she maintained gave greater credence to what 
she said. It was the deceptive mirror which attracted the simple, 
the trap in which the fools were caught. The Cardinal de Rohan 
was not the only one who was taken in by this artifice ; and the 
swindle of one hundred and sixty thousand francs, of which he 
had been the victim, was but child's play beside the unheard-of 
stroke which chance put into the hands of Madame de la Motte. 

Two jewellers to the crown, Boehmer and Bassange, had set as 
a necklace a magnificent collection of diamonds, which had been 
gathered together at great expense and after long research. As- 
tonished themselves at the price that this ornament reached, and 
despairing to sell it to any one except sovereigns, knowing, more- 
over, the taste which the queen on frequent occasions had mani- 
fested for gems, they got the first gentleman of the bedchamber 
to propose it to the king. Louis XVI., astonished at the beauty 
of the necklace, and passionately fond of his wife, who had just 
presented him with his first child, had contemplated offering this 
exquisite necklace as a present to her in her convalescence. He 
had carried the case to her. They were then in the midst of the 
American war. The queen looked at the gems, admired them, 
but refused to accept them. ** We have greater need of a vessel 
than of this necklace," she replied simply. 

Boehmer was in despair. To retain in his hands an object of such 
value, to tie up a capital of sixteen hundred thousand francs, — 
this was the price which the experts Doigny and Maillard had 



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THE NECKLACE. 303 



estimated the necklace to be worth, — was ruin. He proposed the 
necklace to various sovereigns ; all were frightened at the price. 
He returned to Marie Antoinette; she refused as before. Re- 
pulsed on all sides, the jeweller solicited an audience, and there, 
as though seized with delirium, he threw himself at the feet of the 
princess, clasped his hands, and burst into tears. *' Madame,'* he 
cried, ** I am ruined, dishonoured, if you will not buy my necklace. 
I do not wish to survive so many misfortunes. I shall depart 
hence, Madame, to go and throw myself into the river.'* ** Rise, 
Boehmer,** the queen said to him, severely. ** I have not ordered 
this necklace of you ; I have refused it. The king wished to give 
it to me, and I refused it; never speak to me of it again. Try to 
break it up, and to sell it, and don't drown yourself. I am very 
angry with you for having made this scene in my presence, and 
before this infant.** (She had her daughter, Madame Royale, 
near her.) "Never let anything like this happen again. Go.*' 
Boehmer withdrew, broken-hearted, and for a certain time no one 
saw anything more of him. 

In the month of December, 1784, the partner of Boehmer, Bas- 
sange, heard one of his friends, named Achet, talk of the favour 
of Madame de la Motte. It was a last resource; he thought to 
profit by It. At his request Achet sought the countess, and 
begged her to use her influence to persuade the queen to buy an 
ornament which was only suitable to her. The adventuress replied 
in an evasive manner, but expressed the desire to see the object of 
the negotiation. The jeweller hastened to grant the wish of a per- 
son so well received at court, and on December 29 Bassange and 
Achet carried the necklace to Madame de la Motte. The latter 
looked at the diamonds, admired them, and without giving any 
positive assurances, nevertheless allowed them to hope. 

Three weeks passed ; and the jewellers began to fear that this 
effort had also failed, when on January 21 Madame de la Motte 
announced to them that the queen had determined to purchase 
the necklace, but that not wishing to negotiate the acquisition 
directly, she had charged a great noble, who enjoyed her confi- 
dence, to do so. Three days later, the count and countess came 
in search of Bassange at seven o'clock in the morning, and said 
to him that the great noble in question would soon appear, 
A quarter of an hour later, in fact, the negotiator, who had been 
announced, appeared. It was, as we may imagine, the Cardinal 
de Rohan. He examined the necklace in detail, asked the price 



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304 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

of it, then withdrew, declaring that he would give an account 
of the conversation which he had just had to the person who had 
sent him ; that he did not know if he would be permitted to men- 
tion her, but that in any case he hoped the jewellers would 
accept her conditions. 

He made these conditions known on January 29 : the price of 
the necklace was fixed at sixteen hundred thousand francs ; the 
payments should be made in four instalments, six months apart; 
the first should fall due on August I. The delivery of the jewels 
should be made on Tuesday, February i ; the purchaser should 
remain unknown, and exacted the greatest secrecy in the whole 
affair. Boehmer and Bassange accepted these terms, and placed 
their signature at the bottom of the treaty, which was entirely in 
the handwriting of the Prince de Rohan. 

On the 1st of February, early in the morning, they betook 
themselves to the H6tel de Strasburg, in the Rue Vieille du 
Temple. The cardinal acknowledged to them then that the pur- 
chaser of this precious ornament was no other than the queen, 
and showed them the act of acquisition signed with the appro- 
bation of that princess. Each article bore the word " Approved ; " 
and beneath the last line was traced the signature, ** Marie An» 
toinette of France." At the same time the cardinal showed to 
the happy merchants a pretended letter from the queen, which 
he folded over so that only these words could be seen : " I am 
not in the habit of treating with my jewellers in this manner; you 
will keep this paper, and arrange everything as you think best.** 

Letter, approbation, and signature were fabricated by Retaux. 
But the jewellers did not know the handwriting of the queen, who 
had never given them any orders except verbally, or through 
the intermediation of one of her women. Better versed in com- 
mercial customs than in the royal signature, they did not reflect 
that the words " Marie Antoinette of France *' were improbable ; 
they withdrew convinced — and who would not have been in 
their place? — that the purchaser of the necklace was indeed the 
brilliant sovereign, whose taste for gems they knew. 

That very evening, the cardinal set out for Versailles. Fol- 
lowed by a footman, Schreiber, who carried the precious case, he 
went directly to Madame de la Motte at the H6tel de la Belle 
Image. He had hardly arrived before a man entered bearing a 
letter. Madame de la Motte took it, broke it open, read it, and 
said to him aloud that it was a note from the queen, and that the 



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THE CARDINAL'S CREDULITY. 305 

bearer was a lackey of the chamber, named Desclaux. A few 
moments after, this man re-entered. Monsieur de Rohan had 
only time to hide behind an alcove, whose door was half open, 
and from there he saw Madame de la Motte give the necklace 
to the pretended lackey, who was no other than Retaux. The 
cardinal recognized him positively for the man who had assisted 
in the preceding year at the scene in the avenue. 

On the following day, February 2, which was a festival, Bas- 
sange was in the gallery at Versailles, and placed himself where 
he should see the royal family, in order to be among the first 
to enjoy the spectacle of his famous diamonds, whose thousand 
lights would undoubtedly sparkle upon the neck of the queen, as 
she passed on her way to the chapeL The Prince de Rohan was 
also on the watch. Complete deception ; the queen passed ; she 
had on only her ordinary jewels. Bassange was astonished ; but 
the cardinal, although surprised himself, reassured him by saying 
that the queen undoubtedly did not wish to wear her necklace 
before having apprised the king of her acquisition, and that she 
had not had time to inform him. Days passed ; months passed ; 
occasions for full dress occurred ; and the queen persisted in not 
wearing her new ornament. She went to Paris after the birth of 
the Due de Normandie. On that solemn occasion, no necklace. 
Pentecost came ; still nothing. She saw the cardinal, and always 
treated him with the same disdain. A strange mystery ! What 
was the meaning of such caprice? 

Was not this extraordinary obstinacy likely to open the eyes 
of the blind prelate? Not yet; Madame de la Motte was there to 
ward off the danger. In order to counteract the effects of this 
coldness, which might alarm and enlighten her dupe, she took 
care to transmit to him more frequently than ever the famous 
notes on blue paper with vignettes, which, by their protestations 
of secret sympathy, calmed his distrust In order the better to 
maintain his illusions, she pretended to borrow a few louis from 
him ; and when he came to see her in the Rue Neuve St. Gilles, 
she received him in a small, ill-furnished room, which was very 
high up. How should the cardinal, reassured on the score of 
the queen by these forged letters, and on that of Madame de la 
Motte by her evident distress, grow suspicious? During this 
time the necklace was taken to pieces. Retaux at Paris, Mon- 
sieur de la Motte in London, sold the parts of it; and the count, 
on his return from England on June 3, presented to the banker 
VOL. I. — 20 r^ T 

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306 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

Perregaux letters of credit for one hundred and twenty thousand 
francs, which served to support the luxury of the houses at Paris 
and at Bar-sur-Aube. 

However, the term of the first payment was approaching; the 
fraud would be discovered. It was necessary for Madame de la 
Motte to gain time. Retaux forged a new letter. The queen 
wrote to the cardinal that she found the necklace decidedly too 
dear; that she demanded a reduction of two hundred thousand 
francs on the price; and that instead of paying, on August i, four 
hundred thousand francs, she should pay seven hundred thousand. 
The prelate went to the jewellers to inform them of the new 
desires of their august client. The two partners at first made 
some difficulties, then they yielded, and on the advice of Mon- 
sieur de Rohan, wrote Marie Antoinette the following letter: — 

Madame, — We are overwhelmed with happiness to dare to think that 
the last arrangements which have been proposed to us, and to which we 
have submitted with zeal and respect, are a new proof of our submission 
and devotion to the orders of your Majesty ; and it gives us great satisfac- 
tion to think that the most beautiful parure of diamonds that exists will be 
worn by the greatest and best of queens. 

On July 12 Boehmer went to Versailles; he was to take the 
bow, the buckle, and the sword destined for the young Due 
d'Angouleme on the occasion of his baptism. On presenting 
these objects to the queen, on her return from mass, he gave her 
at the same time the letter which we have just quoted. Marie 
Antoinette read the letter, understood nothing of it, and burned 
it. It was the more impossible for her to divine the sense of that 
enigmatical language as some time before the jeweller, on being 
questioned by Madame Campan concerning the fate of the 
famous necklace, had declared that he had sold it at Constanti- 
nople to the favourite sultana. A few days after, however, the 
Baron de Breteuil, minister of the household of the king, sent 
for Boehmer, and asked him what his incomprehensible note of 
July 12 had meant. Faithful to his system of mystery, and 
obedient to the instructions of the cardinal, Boehmer contented 
himself with replying that there was question of certain jewels 
which he desired to sell to the queen. In face of these strange 
evasions and careful reticences, how could Marie Antoinette 
imagine that there was anything serious? She believed that the 
mind of her jeweller was affected by the anguish which the neces- 



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BOEHMER APPEALS TO MADAME CAMPAN. 307 

sity of destroying his necklace had caused him; she regarded 
him as a monomaniac, whose folly was not dangerous, and 
merited rather pity than anger. 

The moment arrived, however, when everything was to be dis- 
covered. At the end of July Madame de la Motte produced a 
note wherein the queen avowed that she could not pay before 
October i. The cardinal received it with consternation ; he be- 
gan to have suspicions of the authenticity of the letters; yet 
either from pride, or because of his passion for Madame de la 
Motte, whom he did not wish to ruin, he refused to investigate 
the affair. The adventuress, in order to re-establish a credit which 
she felt was trembling, hastened to give him a sum of thirty 
thousand francs as an indemnity to the jeweller for the delay 
in the payment. The distrust of the cardinal could not with- 
stand a payment of thirty thousand francs; he gave the sum 
to Boehmer on the 30th of July, and doubted no more. But it 
was the merchants who became alarmed in their turn at so many 
delays and mysteries, at the silence of the queen, and the pressure 
of their creditors ; and this disquietude was changed to despair 
when on August 2 or 3, Madame de la Motte declared to them 
impudently that the sale which they had concluded was not 
legal, and that the signature of Marie Antoinette was false. 
"However," she added, "the cardinal is rich; you can hold 
him responsible." 

Bassange ran to the Hotel de Strasburg. Monsieur de Rohan, 
who was beginning to understand, but who did not wish to avow 
it, and was desirous before everything of hushing up a transaction 
which was so humiliating to his vanity, affirmed on oath the authen- 
ticity of the sale. On the following day Madame de la Motte, 
who wished to compromise him still more, arrived at his house 
very much agitated, pretending that she was a victim to a court 
intrigue, a prey to the persecutions of the police ; and the car- 
dinal, who could not resist the strange influence of the adven- 
turess, consented to give her an asylum in his house, together 
with her husband and her waiting-woman. 

In the mean while Bassange's partner, Boehmer, who was but 
half reassured, went to Crespy to see the chief waiting-woman, 
Madame Campan, whom he knew, and asked her if the queen had 
not charged her with some commission for him. On her response 
in the negative, " But," said he, " to whom must I address myself 
to obtain the reply to the letter which I gave her?" "To no 



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308 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOLNETTE. 

one. Her Majesty burned your letter, and did not even under- 
stand what you meant" **But, Madame, that is impossible; the 
queen knows very well that she has some money to give me." 
** Some money. Monsieur Boehmer ! it is a long time since we set- 
tled your last account with the queen." ** Ah, Madame, you are 
very much mistaken ; a very large sum is owing to me." " What 
do you mean?" "It is necessary to tell you everything. The 
queen has kept a secret from you ; she has bought my great neck- 
lace." " The queen ? she refused it ; she refused it when the king 
wished to give it to her." " She changed her mind." ** At what 
time did the queen announce to you that she had decided on 
the acquisition of your necklace? " ** She never spoke to me her- 
self on the subject.'* " Who, then, was her intermediary ? " " The 
Cardinal de Rohan." ** The Cardinal de Rohan ! " Madame Cam- 
pan exclaimed, stupefied ; ** but the queen has not spoken to him 
since his return from Vienna. There is no man at the court in 
greater disfavour. You have been robbed, my poor Boehmer." 
** The queen pretends to be on ill terms with his Eminence, but 
he is in reality in favour with her." ** But how were the orders of 
her Majesty transmitted to you?" "In writing, signed by her 
hand, which I have been forced to show to people from whom I 
have borrowed money for some time, without, however, succeed- 
ing in calming them." " Ah, what an odious intrigue ! " Madame 
Campan cried, more and more stupefied, and not knowing whether 
she had to do with a fool or a scamp ; but feeling that there were 
some infernal machinations to be discovered, she urged Boehmer 
to go immediately to Versailles and inform the Baron de Breteuil. 
But Boehmer, who was probably not anxious to avow to the min- 
ister that he had lied, instead of going to Tiidj, went to Trianon, 
and solicited an audience with the qu^^n. The Utter, who was 
tired of his importunities, refused to see Hihi. " ^e is mad," she 
replied ; " I do not wish to see him." 

A few days after, Madame Campan returned from Crespy ; the 
queen sent for her to go over her role of Rosine with her, .which 
she was to play in " The Barber of Seville." ** Did you know," she 
said to her, " that that imbecile of a Boehmer came here and asked 
to speak to me? I refused to receive him. What did he want of 
me, do you know? " Thus placed in a position to explain, Madame 
Campan related her whole conversation with Boehmer, and the 
strange revelations which he had made. Full of surprise and in- 
dignation, Marie Antoinette sent for the jeweller; he came on 



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THE DISCOVERY. 309 



August Q, insisted upon being paid, and, pressed with questions, 
ended by avowing what had occurred, or at least what he sup- 
posed. The queen listened with growing astonishment and con- 
centrated rage ; she did not know what to think of so much folly 
or so much infamy. 

But before taking any resolution, she wished to investigate the 
affair; and being unable to distinguish the truth in the incoherent 
declarations of the jeweller, she demanded a written explanation, 
which was given to her on August 12. 

"On Boehmer's departure/* Madame Canipan has written, " I found 
her in an alarming state. The idea that any one could believe that such a 
man as the cardinal had her confidence ; that she had made use of him in 
dealing with a merchant to procure for her, unknown to the king, a thing 
which she had refused from the king himself, — threw her into despair." 

But she did not contemplate for an instant hushing up the affair. 
Strong in the testimony of her conscience, and yielding to the exi- 
gency of her just indignation, she wished that the odious intrigue 
should be thoroughly investigated. ** It is necessary," she said, 
" that these hideous vices should be unmasked ; when the Roman 
purple and the title of a prince only hide a needy person or a 
scamp, who dares to compromise the wife of his sovereign, all 
France, all Europe, must know it.*' Was this resolution spontane- 
ous in her? Was it due, as Madame Campan insinuates, to the 
influence of the Ahh6 de Vermond, and to the Baron de Bre- 
teuil, inveterate enemies of the bishop of Strasburg, and who were 
only too desirous of a scandal to ruin him? In this supposition 
the first waiting-woman was wrong. The queen consulted no one 
but her husband. The Jcing came to spend Sunday, the 14th, at 
Trianon ; and it wa^s .with him alone that the queen, enlightened 
by the revelations of. Boehmer, and by the memorial which the 
jewellers had sent her on August 12, determined upon her con- 
duct and the measures it was necessary to take. She thus in- 
forms Joseph II. of the iniquitous affair in a letter written on 
August 22: ** Everything has been concerted between the king and 
nfe ; the ministers knew nothing of it until the moment when the 
king sent for the cardinal, and interrogated him in the presence 
of the keeper of the seals and the Baron de Breteuil/* 

However this may be, it is certain that after an attentive study 
of the facts then known, and of the documents which they had in 
their hands, the king and queen were forced to believe in the cul- 



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3IO LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

pability of the cardinal. His mad prodigalities, his immense 
debts, despite his immense revenues, his bad reputation, the dis- 
content which he had aroused in his own diocese, where the 
people accused him of spending on entertainments, on gallan- 
tries, on useless and magnificent embellishments of his chateau 
of Saverne, his income of eight hundred thousand francs, — every- 
thing seemed to inculpate him. In their verbal account, as well 
as in their memorial, the jewellers only named and incriminated 
him; at three different times, and again in the month of March, 
Parliament had accused him of waste in the administration of the 
Hospital of the Quinze-Vingts, of which he was superior-general. 
However monstrous it might seem, in the face of this united 
evidence, one was led, as the king said and the queen wrote, to 
believe that, pressed by his need for money, he had sought to 
procure it by appropriating the necklace, in the belief that he 
would be able to pay the jewellers at the time stated, without any- 
thing being discovered. One was obliged to look upon him as a 
scamp ; for as yet nothing warranted one's thinking him a dupe. 

On Monday, August 15, at noon, the grand almoner, dressed in 
his pontifical robes, was on his way to the chapel, when Chanlau, 
head footman, informed him that the king wished to see him in his 
cabinet. The queen was there with the keeper of the seals and 
the Baron de Breteuil. 

" You have bought some diamonds from Boehmer," the king 
said to the cardinal. 

** Yes, Sire." 

" What have you done with them? " 

'* I thought they had been given to the queen." 

** Who charged you with the commission? " 

" A lady named the Comtesse de la Motte-Valois, who showed 
me a letter from the queen; and I imagined that I was doing 
something that would be agreeable to her Majesty in undertaking 
the negotiation." 

The queen interrupted him hastily. 

** How could you believe, Monsieur, — you to whom I have not 
spoken for eight years. — that I should choose you to under- 
take such a negotiation, and through the intervention of such a 
woman ? " 

" I see clearly," the cardinal replied, ** that I have been cruelly 
deceived ; I will pay for the necklace. The desire which I had 
to please your Majesty closed my eyes. I suspected no fraud, 
and I am sorry." ^ , 

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THE ARREST OF THE CARDINAL. 31 1 

Then he drew from his pocket a case, and took out the letter 
which he had supposed had been written by the queen to Madame 
de la Motte, giving him this commission. The king took it, and 
showing it to the cardinal, he said, — 

** This is neither the handwriting of the queen nor her signa- 
ture. How could a prince of the House of Rohan, how could 
a grand almoner, imagine that the queen could sign herself 
* Marie Antoinette of France * ? Every one knows that queens 
only sign their baptismal names." 

The cardinal stammered. The king continued, — 

"Explain to me this enigma. I do not wish to find you 
guilty; I desire your justification." 

More and more disturbed, the cardinal turned pale, and 
supported himself against the table. 

** Control yourself, Monsieur le Cardinal, and go into my 
cabinet; you will there find paper, pens, and ink; write what 
you have to say to me." 

The cardinal passed into the cabinet, and returned at the end 
of a quarter of an hour with a writing as little clear as his 
verbal responses had been. The king, convinced of his culpabil- 
ity by his very embarrassment, said to him hotly, ** Retire, Mon- 
sieur ! " and an order was given to arrest him. Neither the 
representations of certain ministers, nor the supplications of the 
prelate, who begged for grace, could change the determination 
of Louis XVI., or persuade him to allow the accused to remain 
at liberty. ** I cannot," he said, '* consent thereto, either as king 
or husband." 

" We must put an end to it," he wrote to Vergennes, who had urged 
him to hush up the affair, — " we must put an end to the intrigues of a 
rascal who has so scandalously compromised the queen, and who, to justify 
himself, has nothing to allege but his intimacy with an adventuress of the 
lowest class. He dishonours his ecclesiastic^ character. Though he has 
become cardinal, he is no less a subject of my crown." 

As for the queen, she desired a public reparation. "I am 
anxious," she wrote to Joseph H., "that this scandal, with all 
its details, should be thoroughly cleared up in the eyes of the 
world." 

The cardinal left the royal chamber with the Baron de Breteuil. 
A young lieutenant of the guards. Monsieur de la Jouffroy, 
was there. " Monsieur," the baron said to him, " the king corn- 



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312 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

mands you not to leave Monsieur le Cardinal, and to conduct 
him to your house. You will be responsible for his person, 
Monsieur." 

Agitated at so unexpected an occurrence, afraid of his respon- 
sibility, fearful, perhaps, for himself, for he was overwhelmed 
with debts, the young man lost his head, and neglected the most 
ordinary precautions : he permitted his prisoner to write a word 
in pencil. This word, given to the cardinal's heiduqtie^ was 
immediately carried to Paris ; and while the major of the body- 
guard, Monsieur d'Agoult, conducted Monsieur de Rohan first to 
tfie Hotel de Strasburg, then to the Bastille, — where he enjoyed 
in the beginning the greatest liberty, holding his court as in his 
hdtel, and continuing, if not to exercise his great functions, at 
least to use the powers of his great office, — the Abb6 Georgel, 
warned by the note, hastened to destroy the letters of Madame 
de la Motte, and everything that might compromise his master. 
When the Baron de Breteuil arrived to put the seals on the car- 
dinal's papers, it was too late; and when, on the 17th, the seals 
were removed in the presence of all the ministers, with the 
exception of the Mar^chal de S6gur, nothing was found. 

Three days after this occurrence, on August 18, at four o'clock 
in the morning, Madame de la Motte was arrested at Bar-sur- 
Aube, as she was returning from an entertainment of the Due 
de Penthiivre at Chdteau-Villain, where she had displayed all 
the splendours of her new fortune. Two months afterward, 
Mademoiselle d'OHva was captured at Brussels, and in the fol- 
lowing spring, Quidor, the agent of police, discovered Retaux 
de Villette at Geneva, where he was in hiding under an assumed 
name. Monsieur de la Motte succeeded in escaping to England. 

Louis XVI. had given to the cardinal the choice of acknowl- 
edging his fault and appealing to the clemency of his sovereign, 
or of being tried by Parliament The cardinal chose the latter; 
and on September 5 the king, filled with indignation, he said, 
'* that any one should have dared to use so august a name and 
one that was dear to us for so many reasons, and violate with 
such unheard-of temerity the respect due to the royal majesty," 
acquainted Parliament by letters-patent with the affair. 

One can easily imagine the scandal that a trial begun under 
such conditions created. A Rohan, grand almoner of France, 
arrested in the palace like any vulgar malefactor! A cardinal 
dragged before a secular tribunal ! The stupefaction was great. 



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THE PARTISANS OF THE CARDINAL. 313 

and the displeasure not less. In Parliament, even before the 
case was opened, President de Corberon, at the instigation of 
D'6pr6m6nil, made a violent attack upon what he called the rape 
of the cardinal ; and all the authority of President d'Ormesson 
was necessary to adjourn the discussion of this burning question. 
At Versailles the court was enraged ; the noblesse were indignant 
at the outrage to one of their order ; tKe clergy complained of 
the imprisonment of a prince of the Church. They called a 
General Assembly on the day following the registration of the 
letters-patent, to protest against these letters, and to demand 
ecclesiastical judges. Would not the bishop of Mayence, who 
was the metropolitan of the bishop of Strasburg, take up the 
affair? And would the emperor tolerate the violation of the 
privileges of a prince of the Empire? These questions were 
asked in public ; and people said to one another, not without a 
secret content, that the authorities would probably be obliged to 
retreat. The court of Rome itself was aroused, blamed the car- 
dinal for having accepted a lay jurisdiction, and threatened him 
with a suspension of his honours and functions. 

The clamour was general. One saw members of the royal 
family, like Mesdames, loudly censure the conduct of their 
nephew and niece for having brought the shady transaction to the 
light. Intimates even of the queen's set, if we may believe Stael, 
— the Polignacs, the Vaudreuils, — took sides against her. The 
House of Cond6, the Rohans, the Soubises, the Gudm6n6es, went 
into mourning, and in this costume placed themselves along the 
passage of the councillors of the great chamber when they went 
to the palace. Some princes of the blood openly petitioned in 
favour of the accused. All who were hostile to royalty, all the 
malcontents, all those who were jealous, all the friends of the 
cardinal, and all the enemies of Marie Antoinette, all the rem- 
nants of the old cabals of D'Aiguillon and of Marsan, — all those 
who were envious of the grace, beauty, power, or happiness of 
their young sovereign united against her. Parliament itself — 
that secular depository of the laws, that guardian of the majesty 
and the impartiality of justice — was not able to preserve, in that 
serious debate, the immutable serenity of a judge; it made 
a political question of it, an instrument of opposition. " That 
great body," Beugnot said, *'is beginning to lose self control." 
It allowed itself in great part to be corrupted, and one was able 
to lay before the queen the list of the members of the great 



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314 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

chamber who had been bribed by the Rohans, and the amount 
of money which had been used to bribe them. 

** The women," Madame Campan said, *' played a part in this 
affair which was an outrage to morality: it was through them, 
and by reason of the considerable sums which they had received, 
that the oldest and most respectable heads were seduced." A 
mattre des requites^ who was present at the session when the 
documents of procedure were read, took note of what was there 
said, and transmitted to the advocates of the accused a plan 
of defence. And the Abb6 Georgel confessed that that same 
vehement adversary of royalty, who was later to defend it with 
equal violence, and to expiate his blind enthusiasm on the scaf- 
fold, D'Epr^m^nil, informed the friends of the Rohans of all the 
interesting particulars which might be useful to them. 

** I am charmed that we have no longer to talk of this horror," 
the queen wrote to her brother, shortly after the presentation of 
the case in Parliament. The queen was mistaken : it was by no 
means finished. The public was too agitated to keep silence ; 
and the partisans of the cardinal, above all, his secretary, neg- 
lected no means to excite their emotion. This sorry person — 
whom Louis XVI., in a moment of legitimate indignation, had 
wished to turn out-of-doors at Versailles, and of whom he had 
written to Vergennes, '* He who can lie once can lie twenty 
times," and whom Parliament itself had accused of forgery — 
avenged himself for the just contempt of his sovereign by re- 
doubling his intrigues and outrages against his queen. Using 
his privilege as vicar-general of the grand almoner, he had 
printed and attached to the doors of the sacristies and the 
churches dependent upon the grand almoner, even to the door 
of the king's chapel, a statement wherein he compared Mon- 
seigneur de Rohan to Saint Paul in irons, and himself to Timothy. 
A lettre de cachet exiled him to Mortagne. This was the only 
rigorous measure taken against his insulting effrontery. One 
has accused the old monarchy of despotism ; if ever government 
exhibited patience, pushed even to weakness, it was the govern- 
ment of Louis XVI. 

By one of those inconsistencies dear to the French, public 
opinion, which had until then been so justly severe on the cardi- 
nal, whom it had declared to be worthy rather of contempt than 
hatred, now gave him its sympathy, if not its esteem, at the very 
time when he least merited it. It regarded him as a victim, 



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TRIAL OF THE CARDINAL.- 315 

when it should have regarded him as an unfortunate man and a 
fooL But he had compromised the name of his queen in a low 
intrigue; he had outraged her by his insensate hopes. This 
was enough to make him popular. A lady of the court wittily 
wrote, "The cardinal to-day has for defenders all those who 
have never come in contact with him." The dependants of the 
House of Rohan, who were scattered everywhere, sought to arouse 
interest for the accused among the middle class and the popu- 
lace. Even fashion took part ; the women wore hats " au cardi- 
nal " at Longchamps, and decked themselves with yellow and 
red ribbons, " cardinal on straw colour ; " the men carried snuff- 
boxes of ivory, with a tiny black spot, *' au cardinal blanchi." 
The following couplet was sung in the streets : — 

"Our Holy Father reddened him ; 
The king and queen have blackened him ; 
But Parliament will whiten him. 
Hallelujah!" 

The popular poet was not mistaken; he saw clearly into the in- 
trigues of the enemies of the queen, and had divined the issues 
of the trial. 

The investigation of this long and shady affair lasted more 
than nine months. Finally, on the nights of the 29th and 30th 
of May, 1786, the prisoner was transferred from the Bastille to 
the Conciergerie. On the 30th, he appeared before Parliament. 
All the Rohans were ranged at the door of the great chamber, 
awaiting the judges. As soon as these appeared, ** Messieurs," 
the Comtesse de Marsan said to them, " you are going to judge 
us all." When the cardinal entered the audience-chamber, he 
was received with the greatest honours ; he was permitted to sit 
down, and the councillors saluted him. When he went out, all 
the judges rose, which was a very great distinction. He was not 
treated as an accused person, but as a prince, almost as a sover- 
eign. He sought, moreover, to excuse himself; feeling that he 
was in the presence of judges already prepossessed in his favour, 
and that it required but little to win them over completely, he 
humbled himself, alleged his good faith and his credulity. ** I 
have been completely blinded," he said, " by the great desire I 
had to regain the good graces of the queen." Madame de la 
Motte was more audacious ; she denied everything. 

The procurator-general, Joly de Fleury, presented his opinion. 



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3l6 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

He would require that the cardinal be made to declare that he 
had acted boldly in permitting himself to believe in a nocturnal 
meeting on the terrace at Versailles, and in undertaking, unknown 
to the king and queen, a negotiation for the purchase of the 
necklace ; that he should demand their pardon in the presence 
of the bench ; and finally that he should be condemned to hand 
in his resignation as grand almoner, and not to approach any 
place where the royal family might be. 

He had hardly finished, when, *' Fie, then, Monsieur ! " cried 
the Councillor Siguier, " this opinion is that of a minister, and not 
that of a procurator-general." " This is the opinion of a savage," 
Montgodefroy exclaimed. A violent tumult arose in the as- 
sembly ; opprobrious names were exchanged among the magis- 
trates. The reporters of the affair, Titon de Villotran and Dupuis 
de Mor^e, adopted the opinion of the procurator-general, together 
with fifteen councillors, among whom was Monsieur d'Am^court. 
President d*Ormesson suggested a middle way : he proposed to 
allow the cardinal to keep his offices and dignities, while con- 
demning him to ask the queen's pardon. But the members 
opposed to the court, the Fr^teaus, the H^rault de S6chelles, the 
Barillons, the Robert de Saint- Vincents, thought that the prelate 
should be discharged of all accusation ; the latter even dared to 
blame, without any reserve, the conduct of the king and of the 
queen, and the public trial of the grand almoner. Parliament, 
which should have set the example of respect to authority, pub- 
lished its contempt for it. Despite the opinion of the first presi- 
dent, and although the best minds supported the opinion of 
the procurator-general, the opponents carried the day. 

A chronicler who is above suspicion adds, " It is certain that 
a very strong cabal was necessary to obtain this. . . . The more 
one reflects on the opinion of the procurator-general, the wiser 
one finds it, despite the fury of Monsieur de Siguier, and the 
cries of the public, which was almost entirely composed of the 
partisans of the Rohans." 

On May 31, at nine o'clock in the evening, after a deliberation 
of eighteen hours, sentence was pronounced. With a majority of 
26 against 23, Madame de la Motte was condemned to be 
whipped and to be imprisoned in Salpetriire; Monsieur de la 
Motte to the galleys for contumacy; Retaux de Villette to 
banishment ; Mademoiselle d'Oliva was not implicated ; the com- 
plaint against the cardinal was simply dismissed. 



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THE CARDINAL IS BANISHED. 317 

As soon as the sentence was known, there was noisy applause 
from the ten thousand persons who, since seven o'clock in the 
morning, had filled the hall of the Pas-Perdus. Enthusiastic accla- 
mations greeted the judges on their exit, as if indeed, as an his- 
torian has justly said, there had been question of a great citizen 
saved by courageous magistrates. Had it not been for an adroit 
subterfuge of Monsieur de Launay, who led away his prisoner by 
a private passage, the people would have unharnessed the horses 
of the cardinal and dragged his carriage to the Hotel de Soubise. 
When, on the following day, the grand almoner, who was inno- 
cent of the crime of swindling, but who was culpable in the first 
degree of Ihe-majest^y left the Bastille, it was to the noise 
of clapping of hands, and cries of ** Long live Monsieur le Car- 
dinal ! " His hotel was illuminated with such a profusion of 
lights that he was embarrassed at a brilliancy which, as Madame 
de Sabran wittily remarked, showed his shame so clearly. The 
fish-women went to congratulate him ; and the crowd constrained 
him to appear upon his balcony in his invalid costume, in a 
white cap and waistcoat, for he was suffering. The accused 
became victor. The true criminal was the queen, or rather the 
monarchy ; when a people have come to the point of showing 
such disrespect to their princes, the hour of revolution will soon 
sound. 

Justly more severe than Parliament, the king deprived the 
cardinal of all his orders and of all his offices, and exiled him to 
his abbey of Chaise-Dieu, where he was soon forgotten by his 
friends. "Congratulate me; he is gone," Madame de Marsan 
said. Somewhat later he received permission to reside at Mar- 
moutiers, where, on reflection, he was heard to deplore his blind- 
ness and his mad expectations. But if Louis XVL might with 
time show a little leniency, on the day following that unexpected 
judgment he could only act with rigour. \^^ith his loyal nature 
and the high idea he had of the majesty of the throne, it was 
impossible for him to allow that the man who had inflicted a 
mortal outrage on his queen, in supposing her capable of meet- 
ing him at night, and of buying, without the knowledge of her 
husband, a necklace worth sixteen hundred thousand francs, 
should go unpunished. ** Although acquitted of the theft of the 
necklace, which was the question submitted to justice," Vergennes 
wrote, ** he, Rohan, was not acquitted of his imbecile credulity, 
and of having thought himself the agent of the queen in this 



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3l8 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

clandestine bargain." The king, moreover, did not believe the 
cardinal as innocent of the swindle as Parliament had declared ; 
and it must be said that at that epoch many persons shared this 
opinion. t^v>^ e/>r.f^npf> ^f M fV\M ' was, in the eyes of the honest 
monarch, the work of party prejudice. " They only saw in the 
affair a prince de Rohan, and a prince of the Church," he said, 
" while he was nothing but a man pressed for money, and only 
used his position to dig a ditch in which Monsieur le Cardinal 
was precipitated in his own turn. Nothing is easier to see, and 
one need not be an Alexander to cut this Gordian knot." 

As for the queen, she was indignant at the issue of the trial, 
which was so insulting for her. 

" Condole with me," she said to Madame Campan. " The in- 
triguer, who wished to ruin me or to procure money for himself 
by using my name and forging my signature, has just been fully 
acquitted; but," she added vehemently, **as a Frenchwoman, 
allow me to condole with you. A people is indeed unhappy to 
have for its supreme tribunal a rabble of men who only consult 
their passions, and of whom some are susceptible of corruption, 
and others of an audacity which they have always manifested in 
the face of authority, and which they have just exhibited in the 
most striking manner against those who are clothed with it." 
The sound of her voice, her shrill tone, her broken speech, the 
bitterness of her gesture, the irony of her language, the contor- 
tion of her features, the compression of her lips, — everything in 
her appearance bespoke the depth of a wound which nothing 
could heal. A very natural grief! A very just indignation ! It 
was the first time that the queen had boldly made an appeal to 
justice, and had courageously courted publicity. Justice had 
replied by an insult, publicity by calumny. 

And yet can we regret this publicity? We think not If the 
affair had been suppressed, as Monsieur de Vergennes desired, 
the consequences, as far as public feeling was concerned, would 
have been almost the same. The time was passed when a lettre 
de cachet could hide forever a prisoner in the Bastille without 
public cognizance of his name. A grand almoner of France 
could not have been exiled without public knowledge of it and 
inquiry as to the cause of the sudden punishment. Whatever 
precautions might have been taken, something would always 
have transpired, and that something, exaggerated, commented 
on, carried by the thousand voices of rumour, would have become 



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HER INNOCENCE ESTABLISHED. 319 

a new calumny, which, in the absence of authentic documents, it 
would have been forever impossible to refute. 

To-day we know at least, thanks to the documents of the trial, 
the facts of this shady affair. The intrigue is unmasked in all 
its details ; we know who were the criminals, the dupes, the ac- 
complices, and the victims. The absolute innocence of the queen 
has been proved by the clearest evidence; and if her contem- 
poraries, ill-disposed and angry, sought to find a new weapon 
against her honour in that odious intrigue, posterity, more en- 
lightened and just, has loudly proclaimed that everything was 
done without her knowledge and against her desires. 



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CHAPTER XXI. 

Last Days of Happiness.— Journey to Cherbourg. — The Court at 

FONTAINEBLEAU IN I786. — ThE GOODNESS OF THE QUEEN. — MARIE 

Antoinette and her Children. — The Sons of the Marquise 

DE BOMBELLES AND OF THE MARQUISE DE SABRAN. — DAYS OF 

Sorrow. — Scenes at Trianon described by Madame Campan. 

— Calumny. — Pamphlets and Songs. — Visit of the Archduke 
Ferdinand, and of the Duchess of Saxe-Teschen. — Acquisi- 
tion OF St. Cloud. — "Madame Deficit." — Calonne and the 
Queen. — Representation of " Athalie." — The Portrait of the 
Queen is not Exhibited. — Estrangement from the Polignacs. 

— The Death of Sophie Beatrix. 

THREE weeks after the end of the trial, Louis XVI. set out 
for Normandy. He was to visit the immense works which, 
under the direction of Dumouriez, were to make of Cherbourg 
a great military post, an advance post of surveillance, or, if need 
were, of defence against England. A royal journey was ordina- 
rily a solemn and expensive affair. Louis XVL made his with- 
out pomp and almost without retinue, taking with him only his 
first equerry, his captain of the guards, his first gentleman of the 
chamber, four officers of the Light Guards, and eight guards, 
and refusing all official receptions. He visited everything at 
Cherbourg, was present on the day following his arrival at three 
o'clock in the morning, at the immersion of one of the cones of 
the dike which closed the harbour, inspected the works of the 
citadel, watched the manoeuvres of the fleet under Monsieur de 
Rioms, astonishing every one by the correctness and extent of 
his knowledge, and charming every one by his benevolence 
and simplicity. Charming stories were told of him, similar to 
those told of Henri IV. On passing through Houdan, he had 
entered the house of a peasant woman for a moment. This 
woman, delighted to receive her king, threw herself at his feet, 
and besought him to grant her a favour. "What is it?" asked 



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INSTANCES OF THE KING'S AFFABILITY. 321 

the prince. " Sire, it is to kiss you." He consented with a good 
grace, then added, ** Now it is my turn." And a chronicler re- 
lates that the royal kiss was given in such a manner as to lead 
one to think that the occurrence had not displeased his Majesty. 

Nor was this all. The king demanded of the peasant it she 
desired nothing more. " No, Sire," replied the woman ; " I have 
no wants ; I am now happier than a queen. But I have a very 
poor neighbour, who has eleven children, and whose creditors 
are threatening to seize her effects." Louis XVI. sent for the 
neighbour, promised to arrange her affairs, and kept his word. 

Such anecdotes became known, and attracted a crowd round 
the monarch. This journey of eight days was a perpetual ova- 
tion. At Caen, where the keys of the city were presented to 
him, with these words, '* Cordibus apertis inutilesy' and where he 
ordered the guards to allow every one — " my children," as he 
called them — to approach ; at Rouen, where, to satisfy the 
people, he walked down the Rue de Pont; at Honfleur, where 
he saw for the last time the evolution of the squadron ; at Havre, 
where he arrived after a stormy passage, — everywhere, in the 
army, in the navy, in the city, and in the country, there re- 
sounded that cry which was then so French, " Long live the 
king ! " The prince was happy over these acclamations, which 
were becoming rare near the throne. To the cry of " Long live 
the king ! " he replied with the cry, " Long live my people ! " 
'* You will, I think, be content with me,*' he wrote gayly to the 
queen, to whom he sent news every day, " for I have not once, I 
think, made use of my gruff tone." He was delighted with his 
journey, and every one was delighted with him. It seemed as if 
it were a renewal of that ancient tie which, since centuries, had 
united the dynasty and France, a fresh vow of loyalty on the 
part of the people, of love and kindness on the part of the 
king. When on June 29 Louis XVL returned to Versailles, still 
moved by the applause of an entire province, he took his second 
son, the Due de Normandie, in his arms. ** Come, my big Nor- 
man," he said to him, laughing, "thy name will bring thee 
luck!" 

The queen was not less pleased than the king at the popular 
enthusiasm. She envied it, perhaps, for she was no longer 
accustomed to it. There was, however, during that year a 
renewal of her popularity. This was during the autumn, at 
Fontainebleau. 
VOL. I. — 21 



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322 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

** There was such a crowd at Fontainebleau,'* Madame de Stael wrote 
to Gustavus III., "that you could only talk to the two or three persons 
who were playing with you, and there was no pleasure to be got from 
being in society except the pleasure of being stifled ; but it was above all 
around the queen that the waves of the crowd surged. . . . The ex- 
pression of countenance of all those who awaited a word from her was 
a sufficiently interesting study for the observer Sonf*e tried to attract her 
attention by immoderate laughing at whit ib.eir ii<^ighbour said to them, 
wiiich under any other circumstance would probabl; hardly have caused 
them to smile. Others assumed a preoccupied, absent-minded air, in 
order not to have the appearance of thinking of that which really absorbed 
them. They turned their heads in the opposite direction ; but despite 
this, their eyes were glued to the steps of the queen. Others, when the 
queen asked them what the weather was like, thought that they must not 
miss such an occasion of making themselves known, and replied at great 
length to her question ; but others again showed respect without fear, and 
eagerness without avidity." 

Thus at the end of 1786, and even in the beginning of 1787, 
Marie Antoinette was still the star to which all eyes turned. 
Her light was still radiant, though already somewhat tempered 
and veiled by I know not what shade of melancholy. The queen 
felt that she was growing old; and already, in 1785, she had 
declared to Mademoiselle Bertin that as she was nearly thirty, 
she had decided to give up all those ornaments which were 
suited to extreme youth, and that she would no longer wear 
either feathers or flowers. She was no longer the lively and gay 
young woman with the slender waist, the rippling and sometimes 
mocking laugh, eager for pleasure and easily carried away, 
fond of balls, races, and play. She was a woman of thirty, with 
a more imposing aspect, beginning to grow stout, with that 
amplitude of form which adds majesty, without heaviness, to 
elegance; her smile, always enchanting, was graver; she felt 
the weight of the crown, and was matured by experience. If 
Mercy had still addressed his secret reports to the empress, they 
would no longer have been filled with complaints against the 
dissipation and frivolity of the princess; for at the very time 
when Marie Antoinette began to be the butt of calumny, she 
least deserved it. 

The court was well regulated ; the balls were brilliant. All 
games of hazard were severely forbidden ; the queen banished 
from her table all high players, renounced the excitement of faro 



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HER GOODNESS. 323 



for the calmer pleasure of billiards, reprimanded the Comte 
d'Artois, who was always impetuous and light, separated herself 
from young people to discourse from preference with grave and 
serious men, and, as an eye-witness has said, ** clearly showed, by 
her attitude and her conversation, that she knew how to preserve 
the principles of honour and probity among those who sur- 
rounded her." She encouraged arts and industry, took under her 
protection the glass manufactory of St. Cloud, and in order to 
encourage the weaving of silk, which had been established at 
Paris by a Monsieur Villiers, declared that in the future she 
would wear only French silks. She economized in her dress, and 
— pardon the detail which is somewhat vulgar but decisive — 
this woman who was the arbiter of elegance and taste had her 
gowns mended, her skirts retrimmed, her slippers resoled. 

Her intelligence was quick without being profound, and always 
kindly ; she possessed in a supreme degree that obliging memory 
which is so pleasing in princes, and which gains for them 
more hearts than their good deeds. Her bearing was proud. 
Her eye, always limpid, had become more penetrating. Her 
welcome was impressive, without ceasing to be affable. Her 
familiarity was tempered with nobility, her grace with majesty. 
One admired the woman, but was conscious of the queen. Her 
beauty attracted all eyes ; her goodness attracted all hearts ; her 
natural dignity commanded respect. " It is difficult, I think, to 
throw more grace and kindness into civility," Madame de Stael 
wrote. " She has, however, a kind of affability which does not 
allow you to forget that she is queen, and yet always persuades 
you that she has forgotten it." 

Then beneath the diadem of the sovereign, one saw the smile of 
the mother; she was there with her four children, — for on July 
9, 1786, a second princess, Sophie Beatrix, had been bom. She 
was there at Fontainebleau as at Versailles, leaning over their 
cradle, attentive to every movement, watching their sleep with 
tenderness, alarmed at the smallest illness, shuddering before an 
attack of coughing, trembling at a fever, watching beside their 
beds when they were inoculated, and pushing her precaution to 
the point of shutting herself up with them in the chdteau, in order 
that they might not communicate the contagion to the children 
who might come to play in the park, following with a vigilant 
eye and enlightened solicitude their physical, intellectual, and 
moral development She reproved their impatience, and allowed 



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324 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

them to exhibit no pride. She desired her daughter to have only 
four women; she took her with her to Fontainebleau in order 
not to lose sight of her education ; and during this time, the dau- 
phin, who was still quite young, remained at La Muette, dressed 
simply as a little sailor, accessible to every one, and delighting all 
by his affability. There is not a letter to Marie Antoinette's friends, 
not a letter to her brothers, which does not abound in details of 
the health and a thousand incidents in the life of her dear little 
ones. She goes to see them at every hour of the day and night ; 
and once when she had gone unexpectedly to see the Due de 
Normandie, to whom some leeches had been applied without 
forewarning her, she fell in a faint from the shock and the fright 
With what anguish did she follow the first symptoms of the dis- 
ease which was to carry off the dauphin ! But also how she 
rejoiced in the good health of her second son, so strong, so well, 
so fresh, — ** a true peasant child,** she said gayly. 

And at the same time, what efforts she made to form their 
minds, above all, their hearts ! One year, on the approach of the 
1st of January, she had the most beautiful playthings brought 
from Paris to Versailles ; she showed them to her children, and 
when they had looked at them and admired them, said to them 
that they were without doubt very beautiful, but that it was still 
more beautiful to distribute alms ; and the price of these presents 
was sent to the poor. 

Thus she made her children serve their apprenticeship in 
charity. While the Ahh6 d'Avaux taught Madame Royale 
grammar and history, the queen gave her daughter lessons in 
handiwork ; she herself taught her to do needle-work, and 
accustomed her little hands to make chemises and baby clothes, 
which she had distributed among the indigent by the cur6s of 
Versailles. It was not to her greatest favourites, but to the most 
worthy, that she confided the care of her children. When the 
dauphin had arrived at an age to have a governor, neither Mon- 
sieur de Vaudreuil was chosen, despite the support of the Po- 
lignacs, nor the Due de Guines, who had formerly been in favour, 
nor the Due de la Vauguyon, although he had been educated 
with the king; she sent for the Due d'Harcourt, in his province 
of Normandy, whose reputation for honesty was well established. 
The queen not only presided over their education, but she took 
part in the games of her young family. In order to amuse them, 
she assembled about her, at Trianon or at Versailles, the sons and 



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HER AFFECTION FOR CHILDREN. 3^5 

daughters of the principal personages of the court ; she danced 
with them ; she had them play comedies, and often took part in 
them herself. This love for children, which was so deep in Marie 
Antoinette, overflowed even for the children of others. The cor- 
respondence and memoirs of the time are filled with charming 
instances of this sweet and pure passion. No beautiful child 
appeared at court that the queen did not notice him, admire him, 
and caress him. One day it was the little boy of Madame de 
Bombelles, whom she perceived as he came out of Madame 
Elisabeth's apartment; she stopped him to look at him, allowed 
him to play with her fan, and told the happy mother that she 
found him charming. Another time it was Elz^ar de Sabran 
whom she encountered; she embraced him on both cheeks; and 
on the following day she said to Madame de Sabran, ** Do you 
know that I kissed a gentleman yesterday?" " Madame, I know 
it, for he boasted of it; " and the queen laughed, complimented 
the mother on her son, on his height, on his healthy appearance, 
on his talent for playing comedy. And the mother smiled in 
her turn and was delighted and declared that the queen was 
** adorable ; " and fifty years later, the child, who had grown to 
be an old man, preserved and recalled with emotion and a naive 
pride the memory of this kiss from the queen. 

Who would not then have proclaimed her, as the Prince de 
Ligne did, queen by her grace and charity; and who would not 
have cried with him, " It is only the wicked who can speak ill of 
her, and only fools who will believe it "? 

And yet these fools and wicked men were to be met with ; and 
among those very courtiers who pressed about her to solicit a 
glance, how many of them perhaps augmented the number of 
those wicked men and fools ! 

One day at Trianon, on Sept. i6, 1786, Madame Campan, on 
entering the chamber of her royal mistress in the morning, 
found her still in bed, holding some letters in her hand, and 
her face bathed in tears, her voice interrupted by sobs. "Ah, 
the wicked men, the monsters! " the unhappy princess cried. . . . 
" What have I done to them? ... I wish I were dead ! " And 
when Madame Campan offered her some orange-water and ether, 
" No," she replied, with heart-breaking bitterness, ** no ; if you love 
me, leave me ; it would be better if I were dead ! " and throwing 
her arms over the shoulders of her first waiting-woman, she burst 
into tears. . 



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326 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

Madame Campan never knew what was the cause of this violent 
grief, which the friendship alone of the Duchesse de Polignac 
succeeded in calming. It was one of those black clouds which 
threatened to break over the country, and which a purer breeze 
drove away. But how many other clouds were to follow, which 
the breath of friendship could not dissipate ! 

For a long while calumny had appeared on the horizon of the 
queen ; and he who had so well described this spectre in the last 
piece played at Trianon was not free from the suspicion of having 
aided its birth. Marie Antoinette had at first laughed at it, and had 
amused herself with singing the couplets wherein the Chevalier de 
Boufflers had wittily transformed into virtues the faults with which 
the libels had reproached her. But since the adventure, either 
true or false, of the Jew, Angelucci, what a long road had been 
traversed ! First, it is the morality of the queen that is impugned, 
then her friendships, then her expenditures, even her simplicity. 
They sought to alienate her husband's heart from her, and the 
heart of the nation. Indecent pamphlets appeared ; they flooded 
the court and the city ; they were even attached to the door of 
Notre Dame ; they were distributed by the servants of the palace ; 
they were fabricated by inspectors of police ; they glided beneath 
the king's napkin. They were called, — "The Rise of Aurora; " 
** The Loves of our Queen ; " " The Coquette and the Impotent ; " 
" The Trial of the Three Kings," — "a detestable work for every 
good Frenchman," as a chronicler said ; ** The Royal Almanac ; " 
** The Life of Marie Antoinette," and again, '* The Portfolio of a Red 
Heel," and presently essays on the life of Marie Antoinette, and 
the infamous memoirs of Madame de la Motte. It would be im- 
possible to enumerate them all, and still more impossible to quote 
any fragments of them. The lawsuit concerning the necklace 
was a signal for a veritable flood of obloquy. 

The authors for the most part were unknown ; Champcenetz 
was named, and the Marquis de Louvois, Th^venot de Morande. 
The instigators were better known; they were the enemies of 
Choiseul, the D'Aiguillons, the Marsans, even the members of 
the royal family, — Madame Adelaide, and the Due d'0rl6ans, the 
Cond^s, perhaps the Comte de Provence, — all those whom the 
power of the queen threw into the shade, whom her preference 
for others wounded, even those whom her kindness distinguished, 
for the ungrateful were added to the envious. Never was a 
more infernal conspiracy contrived with more cleverness, and by 



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VISIT OF THE ARCHDUKE FERDINAND. 327 

more various conspirators. Never, alas! was a plot more suc- 
cessful. Not an act, not a step, not a word, but was travestied. 
The queen after the peace of 1783 received with distinction some 
English noblemen who came to Versailles and to Fontainebleau, to 
forget the old rivalry of the two countries. Lord Strathaven, the 
Duke of Dorset, Lord Fitzgerald, were said to be the queen's lovers. 
She manifested some sympathy for some young Swedes or Aus- 
trians who had come from their country to spend their blood in 
the service of France, — Fersen, Stedingk, Esterhazy ; these were 
also called lovers, without counting the Frenchmen, — Arthur Dil- 
lon, nicknamed the beautiful Dillon ; Edouard Dillon, at the sight 
of whom Marie Antoinette's countenance ** became radiant; " and 
that miserable fool of a Lauzun, and the Chevalier de Coigny and 
the Comte d'Artois and the Due de Chartres. Obscene songs were 
circulated and received with avidity in the salons, though they were 
not delicate either in point of taste or morality. They were eagerly 
received by Maurepas, who had always loved indecencies, 7— above 
all, when he could use them as a weapon against the power which 
threw him into the shade. And one saw the courtiers ride post- 
haste from Versailles to the opera, to amuse themselves with 
those who sang of the pretended good fortune of the handsome 
Dillon or Monsieur de Coigny. 

In 1785 the Archduke Ferdinand and his wife, following the 
example of his two brothers, made a visit to France, where his 
affability pleased every one ; but the presence of the archduke, 
like that of Maximilian, brought up questions of precedence 
which were new seeds of discord in the royal family. The Duke 
and Duchess of Saxe-Teschen, who came to Versailles a few 
months later, finally carrying out a project which they had formed 
two years before, avoided this inconvenience ; but if they were 
charmed with the affability of the queen, and with her conversa- 
tion, they caught in Paris, that sojourn of pleasure and inconsis- 
tency, the murmurs of calumny and the first rumblings of the 
storm. 

Marie Antoinette, in order to be nearer the capital, and to pro- 
cure for her children, especially for the dauphin, who was already 
suffering, a purer and fresher air during the summer, expressed 
the desire to have the palace of St. Cloud ; the king bought it from 
the Due d'0rl6ans, and gave it to his wife. It was to be a resi- 
dence for the royal family during the extensive repairs which 
were necessary at Versailles. The expense was not as considera- 



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328 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

ble as one imagined, nor disproportioned to the revenues of 
the monarch, since it was covered in great part by sales that were 
made at the same time. No matter; it was the acquisition of 
St. Cloud which ruined the finances of France. Messieurs of 
the Inquiry fulminated against Messieurs of the Great Chamber, 
who had registered the letters-patent of the king, giving six 
millions to the queen to enjoy in her own right, and to dispose 
of as she pleased, as well as of the estates and domains which 
she might acquire by means of this sum; and the voices of 
the salons, the rumour of the street, bestowed on Marie An- 
toinette the injurious and fatal nickname of ** Madame Deficit." 
Four words, printed at the head of the notices attached to 
the park gates, **De par la Reine," — very natural words, 
since the queen was at home at St. Cloud as at Trianon, — aug- 
mented the murmurs and aroused I know not what umbrageous 
susceptibility. One saw therein an encroachment on the privi- 
leges of the king, an attack on the rights of the House of 
France, which was to be despoiled for the profit of the House of 
Austria; and D'£pr6m6nil cried in full Parliament that it was 
impolitic and immoral to see palaces belonging to the queen of 
France. 

Marie Antoinette felt an insurmountable antipathy toward 
Calonne, whose worth she had soon judged. Not only would 
she not ask him for any money, but even refused what he 
offered her; the accounts of the time affirm this, and authentic 
documents establish it. But what did popular malevolence care 
for the truth ? They hummed in the streets this stanza from a 
potpourri^ which was flat and lacking in wit : — 

" All love for Calonne I disclaim, 
*T is for the gold he '11 freely give. 
To him I turn for sure reprieve 
From debts that would disgrace my name ; 
My favourite also plays this game. 
And then we both laugh in our sleeve, in our sleeve." 

When, on the fall of the comptroller-general, the populace 
amused itself by burning his ^^gy, the scroll which hung from 
the manikin which represented him accused the queen of having 
sent to her brother one hundred millions in three years, — and 
this at the moment when that brother was reproaching her for 
having become too French, and for having nothing German 
about her but her face. 



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"MADAME DEFICIT." 329 

Thus calumny descended the steps of the throne to the palace, 
from the palace to the salon, from the salon to the street; and its 
poisoned arrows pierced the heart of the unfortunate woman 
while waiting to strike at her head. In 1783 Madame Lebrun 
painted Marie Antoinette in the graceful costume she wore at 
Trianon, with her straw hat and a white muslin robe;' it was 
immediately rumoured that the queen had been painted in her 
chemise. Four years later, in 1787, there was a similar insult 
for the beautiful picture wherein the same artist represented 
Marie Antoinette surrounded by her children. The frame hav- 
ing been brought empty, ** Ah, here is Madame Deficit! " some 
one cried ; and this malicious saying, wherein was associated a 
vulgar incident and an odious calumny, immediately found 
credit with the public. At the opera the queen was hissed. At 
the Theatre Frangais they made an outrageous application to 
her of the threatening prophecies of Joad against Athalie. A 
caricature was openly sold, which showed Louis XVI. and Marie 
Antoinette seated at a sumptuous table, while a crowd of starv- 
ing people surrounded them, with this legend : ** The king drinks ; 
the queen eats; the people cry." And a day came when the 
lieutenant of police warned the unfortunate princess not to show 
herself again in Paris, as she would not be safe. 

The Comte de la Marck was right in saying, ** It is in the mali- 
cious sayings and lies circulated against the queen that we must 
seek the pretext for the accusations of the Revolutionary tribunal 
against Marie Antoinette in 1793.*' 

And as if all sorrows were to fall at the same time on that 
head which had been radiant so long, friendship itself became 
cold. The favourite so assiduous during the time of good fortune 
became indifferent in the hour of trial. 

Between the queen and the comptroller-general, the Polignacs 
decided in favour of Calonne. The queen was displeased at this ; 
she no longer went to her friend's house without having first 
asked what persons were there; and often after the reply, she 
abstained from going thither altogether. Madame de Polignac. 
instead of being touched, was hurt ; and one day when her royal 
mistress made some affectionate observations to her concerning 
it, " I think," she replied in a cold tone, ** that because your 
Majesty wishes to come to my salon, that is not a reason for you 
to assume to exclude my friends." The queen, who was loyal 
in her affections, did not show that she was hurt at this imperti- 



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330 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

nent reply ; she did more, she excused it. " I am not angry with 
Madame de Polignac," she said; **at bottom she is good and she 
loves me, but those about her have subjugated her." She con- 
tented herself with deserting the salon of her former favourite, 
and separating herself from the young people of her set, and 
bestowed her preference upon a woman who was sweeter, more 
devoted, and totally free from ulterior motives, the Comtesse 
d'Ossun ; and her two friends, Mercy and Fersen, following the 
example of the queen, deserted, in their turn, the Polignac circle. 

The favourite's set was displeased at an estrangement which 
was likely to separate them from the source of all benefits; they 
became jealous of the growing favour of Madame d'Ossun, and 
did not hide their irritation. Madame de Polignac departed to 
go to some springs, and threatened to hand in her resignation ; 
and her friends made common cause with the enemies of Marie 
Antoinette in their war of songs and perfidious insinuations. 
They talked maliciously of a schottische danced by the queen 
with Lord Strathoven at the house of Madame d'Ossun. One 
of the habituh of the Polignac salon, who more than any other 
owed profound gratitude and respect to the queen, wrote one of 
the most wicked couplets against her; and this couplet, founded 
on an odious lie, went to nourish those echoes of Paris and Ver- 
sailles which for a long time had repeated only calumny. 

To the desertions of her friends were added the sorrows of a 
mother. On Wednesday, June 15, 1787, the youngest daughter 
of Marie Antoinette, Sophie Beatrix, only eleven months old, 
was taken with a vague indisposition; on the 19th she died, 
charming in her death, but inflicting upon the heart of the poor 
mother that incurable wound dealt by the first loss of a child. 
The queen, profoundly grieved, shut herself up at Trianon with- 
out equipage or retinue, alone with the king and Madame Elisa- 
beth. ** Come," she wrote to her sister-in-law, ** we shall weep 
over the death of my poor little angel. ... I have need of your 
heart to console mine." 

And when some of her intimate friends, to soften her grief, 
reminded her of the youth of the young princess, ** Do you for- 
get," she replied, "that she would have been a friend?" 

A friend ! she had greater need of one than ever ; and not find- 
ing one on earth, she sought one on high. " For some time," 
the ambassador from Sweden wrote, " the queen seems to have 
turned devout." 



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SHE TURNS TO POLITICS. 33 1 

Assailed as woman, as friend, as mother, she yielded, as she 
herself said, to her ** unfortunate destiny." Despite her repug- 
nance for affairs, she threw herself into the struggle, but not 
without uttering this cry of despair, which Madame Campan has 
preserved : ** Ah, there is no more happiness for me, since they 
have made me a politician ! " 



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CHAPTER XXII. 

The Notables. — Fall of Calonne. — Brienne ; his Reforms ; 
HIS Unpopularity recoils upon the Queen. — Recall of 
Necker. — Convocation of the States-General. — A Flood of 
Brochures. — Deceit of Thiers. — Situation of Marie Antoi- 
nette in 1789 IN Relation to the Royal Family. — The Comtk 
AND Comtesse de Provence. — The Comte and Comtesse d'Ar- 
TOis. — Madame Elisabeth. — Madame. — The CoNDfes. — The 

Due D'ORLfeANS. 

DESPITE his pretension, Calonne had not succeeded in over- 
coming the deficit in the treasury. He had done worse; 
he had sensibly augmented it Parliament was hostile ; the public 
was alarmed ; his financial scheme had failed. The comptroller- 
general resolved upon a grand coup ; he proposed to the king to 
convoke an Assembly of Notables. Louis XVI. adopted the idea 
with enthusiasm ; the notion of imitating Henri IV., of drawing 
near to his people, or at least to their principal representatives, 
of speaking to them face to face, and in a way frankly, pleased 
his generous heart and passion for the public good. On the day 
following that on which he had declared to his council his inten- 
tion of convoking the Notables, he wrote to Calonne, — 

**I was not able to sleep last night, but it was from pleasure.*' 
The queen had not been informed of this project. She was 
hurt, so it was said, at this silence, and remained for several 
hours pensive and silent. Although she took a smaller part in 
politics than was thought abroad and by the public, she was 
beginning to realize the true state of affairs, — the present, with 
its difficulties ; the future, with its perils. The king had only 
confided his intention to the keeper of the seals, Mirom^nil, 
and to Vergennes, who, since the death of the Comte de Maure- 
pas, had fulfilled the functions of prime minister without having 
the title. Unfortunately, nine days before the opening of the 
Assembly, on Feb. 13, 1787, Vergennes died. This was at this 



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CALONNE'S PLANS. 333 



moment a very great loss. The calm and cool judgment of that 
minister, his great experience of men and things, the confidence 
which the king placed in him, the consideration which he en- 
joyed, would have given weight to the plans of Calonne, and 
might have insured their success. With him dead, there was no 
one in the ministry- whose influence was preponderant enough to 
direct opinion. Montmorin, who succeeded him, had neither 
his talent nor his authority; and Breteuil had but mediocre intel- 
ligence, and was moreover unpopular because of his brusqueness, 
besides being the inveterate enemy of the comptroller-general. 

The delay in opening the Assembly, successively fixed for Jan- 
uary 29, then for February 22, was a mistake. The Notables, who 
had arrived in Paris a month before, not knowing what to do with 
themselves, and annoyed at the delay and the time which they 
were obliged to lose, had no other occupation but to listen to the 
criticisms and receive the complaints of the malcontents. The 
public was impatient, on its side. They already laughed and 
sung and announced that the great troop of Monsieur de Calonne 
was about to give the first representations of the ** False Appear- 
ances of Debts and of Repudiation." 

The plans of the minister were vast. They comprised the 
suppression or lessening of certain taxes, such as the capitation 
tax and the tax on salt, a more equal distribution of the income 
tax, which was to strike at the same time all proprietors, 
whether privileged or not, and the establishment in the whole 
kingdom of parish, district, and provincial assemblies. It was a 
political reform as well as a financial reform, — a wise reform, 
on the whole, whose peaceful realization would perhaps have 
prevented many disasters. But in politics it is often less the 
idea than the man who is rejected, and unfortunately the comp- 
troller-general was so despised that his name was enough to dis- 
credit the most useful measure. At the same time, his levity 
prevented him from foreseeing obstacles or contriving the means 
to overcome them. It would have been easy, since the king had 
reserved to himself the choice of the Notables, to make up an 
assembly of enlightened and loyal men, determined to vote for 
a reform which, for the most part, would have been a sacrifice for 
them, — in a word, to insure for himself a majority. Calonne 
neglected even this precaution ; and from the start it was easy to 
see that there would be a formidable opposition, more hostile, 
perhaps, to the person of the minister than to his plan. Feeling 



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334 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

himself attacked, Calonne made the mistake of attacking in his 
turn. His address to the Notables, with an explanation of his 
own system, contained a disguised but transparent criticism of 
the administration of Necker. Necker replied ; his friends took 
sides in the struggle; those whose privileges were threatened 
defended their rights; the Notables, hurt by certain publications, 
exacted statements of receipt and expenditure. There was a 
deluge of recrimination and of complaints — some of them just, 
others of them violent — against a minister whose administration 
gave so many openings to criticism, and whose reputation 
accorded but ill with his protestations of disinterestedness and 
economy. At the end of six weeks, on April 8, Calonne fell. 
Exiled to his estate of Allouville, in Lorraine, he departed, 
furious with the queen, to whom both he and public opinion 
attributed his disgrace and exile. Then when Parliament pres- 
ently decreed his arrest, he lost his head, and with an utter 
disregard of appearances, fled to London, where, if we may 
believe Madame Campan, his rancour made him the accomplice 
of Madame de la Motte in the composition of her infamous 
memorials against Marie Antoinette. 

Who should replace him as comptroller-general? Choiseul 
had died on Sunday, May 9, 1785, carrying with him into the 
tomb, as it were, a last souvenir of the happiness of the queen. 
Two names were proposed as successors to Calonne, — Necker 
and the archbishop of Toulouse, Lom^nie de Brienne. The 
king felt an equal repugnance to them both. " I have no wish," 
he said one day, " either for Necker or the priest." He did not 
deny the talents of Necker, but he feared the defects of his 
character; and hurt by the publication of his work on the 
" Administration of the Finances," he had recently, at the insti- 
gation of Calonne, exiled him to forty leagues from the capital. 

To recall him at that moment, and still more, to give him a 
portfolio, was openly to give the lie to himself, and to shake 
with his own hands the prestige of the royal authority, which 
was already too much weakened. If a few faithful friends, like 
Montmorin, still urged the name of Necker, the situation itself 
seemed to indicate that of the archbishop of Toulouse. His in- 
fluence over the Notables, his position as the avowed chief of the 
opposition against Calonne, and what we to-day call the regular 
rotation of Parliamentary institutions, naturally designated him as 
the successor of the minister whose fall he had brought about 



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THE APPOINTMENT OF BRIENNE. 335 

Ambitious, determined from his infancy to play a great r61e, 
pursuing his ends by every means, but patient and resolute in 
waiting, insinuating and versatile, knowing how to applaud the 
philosophers and to mourn for the Jesuits at the same time, 
welcomed by women, regarded with favour by the economists, 
exhibiting superficial but varied accomplishments, Brienne en- 
joyed in the whole kingdom a reputation for incontestable 
cleverness. 

The king alone felt for this priest, who had no morality and 
perhaps no faith, the aversion which, with his strong religious 
convictions, he felt for all philosophical priests. When on the 
death of Monseigneur Beaumont, archbishop of Paris, Monsieur 
de Brienne was proposed as his successor, ** It is at least neces- 
sary that the archbishop of Paris should believe in God," he had 
answered brusquely. He had, moreover, extreme repugnance to 
admit a priest into his council ; and more than once he had been 
heard to declare that he should never place an ecclesiastic at the 
head of affairs. 

On the other hand, the queen had a high opinion of the arch- 
bishop of Toulouse, and had been accustomed for a long time to 
regard him as the future prime minister. One has attributed this 
opinion of Marie Antoinette to the exclusive influence of the 
Abb6 de Vermond, who was eager to show his gratitude to the 
man to whom he owed his fortune. If the queen had such es- 
teem for the talents of Brienne as to determine her to urge his 
elevation, it is not the Abb6 de Vermond alone who must be 
held responsible for it, but every one, — Choiseul, who had for- 
merly recommended the young Lom^nie to. Louis XV.; the 
financier of Invaux, who consulted and wrote to him, " I ought 
to cede the comptroller-generalship to you ; " Mercy, who, since 
1775, had proclaimed the superiority of the archbishop's talents 
and had almost gone surety for his conduct in religion and 
morals; Joseph II., who two years later, after a conversation 
which pleased him infinitely, went to visit him at Toulouse, and 
conceived of him so high an opinion that he wrote to his sister 
to recommend him to her as one of the persons most capable 
and most fit to enter the ministry. Both Turgot and Malesherbes 
wished to confide to him a portfolio, and only gave it up because 
of the opposition of Maurepas. Maurepas himself only wished 
to keep him out of the council because he regarded him as a 
rival whose superiority might throw him into the shade. The 



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336 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

States of Languedoc, it was said, did not cease to render hom- 
age to his merits and to his intelligence, to the interest which he 
took in the affairs of the province, to the talent with which he 
directed various measures of public usefulness and charity. It 
was, in a word, the general sentiment that Brienne was one of the 
first personages in France, and fitted for the first rdle. 

With such support, and with such public opinion, Vermond 
had no great need to persuade his former pupil that she was 
doing a wise and patriotic deed in placing a man in power whom 
the public voice called there. If the results did not answer to 
the brilliant expectations ; if one perceived too late that he was 
superficial rather than -profound, — at least we must acknowledge 
that the queen was not the only one deceived, and that her illu- 
sion was that of the whole, or almost of the whole nation. 
Brienne*s fame was brilliant; she thought it substantial. 

The friends of Necker rendered such homage to the reputation 
of him whom they were later to attack so violently that the most 
influential among them did not hesitate to open a negotiation in 
order to place the two rivals in the ministry together. The 
Marechal de Beauvau conducted the affair; it was agreed that 
the archbishop should be the first to enter, and that three 
months later he should give the direction of the finances to 
Necker. The king, urged at the same time by both parties, 
ended, despite his personal repugnance, by believing that the 
public demanded the nomination of Monsieur de Brienne. He 
spoke of it to the queen : ** I have always heard Monsieur de 
Brienne spoken of as a very distinguished man;" that princess 
replied, ** I shall see him enter the ministry with pleasure." 

On the 1st of May, 1787, the archbishop of Toulouse was 
made chief of the council of finance ; Monsieur de Fourqueux, 
who had filled the interval after the fall of Calonne, an honest 
man, but without talent, was replaced by Monsieur de Villedeuil; 
and Necker was once more set aside. The Due de Nivernais 
entered the council ; Monsieur de Malesherbes was also recalled. 
But Brienne was one of those men who, according to the saying 
of the poet, shone in the second rank, but went under an eclipse 
in the first. Having arrived at the summit of his desires, he 
soon revealed himself such as he was, — without great views, with- 
out serious knowledge, without ideas, and without plan. In- 
capable of any innovations, he was only able to resume with 
slight modifications the schemes of Calonne; and at the end of 



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DISSOLUTION OF THE ASSEMBLY OF NOTABLES. 337 

a month the Assembly of the Notables was dissolved, without 
having accomplished anything, leaving the finances in disorder, 
the public apprised of the disorder, the royal authority weakened, 
since it had been obliged to yield, and their own prestige gone, 
since they had realized none of their solemn promises, carrying 
away with them and sowing in their own provinces the germs of 
discontent and revolution. 

It would seem that once alone and rid of the Notables, who, 
moreover, before their departure had given him a species of carte 
blanche, Brienne would act with promptitude and vigour. He 
did nothing of the sort; he lost precious time, undertook insuf- 
ficient measures, and when he finally sentrfhe acts which decreed 
the principal financial reforms for registration, the resistance 
which he had no longer to fear from the Notables he found more 
obstinate and implacable from Parliament. 

Jealous of the popularity which had for a moment surrounded 
the Notables when they had fought Calonne, displeased with the 
court, since it had offended it in the affair of the necklace. Parlia- 
ment had become more and more determined in its course of oppo- 
sition. This ardent defender of the rights of the people made itself 
the champion of the privileged, because at that moment the privi- 
leged were struggling against the government. Some of the coun- 
cillors, like D'Epr6m6nil, Fr^teau, Duport, fanned the flame and 
added fuel to the fire. They declared that before consenting to 
a new tax they must know the condition of the treasury; their 
pretension was denied. " You would demand to know the state of 
receipt and expenditure," the Abb6 Sabattier cried. **We de- 
mand the States-General." . . . The redoubtable question had 
been opened, and with characteristic French levity had been 
propounded by a play of words. D*£pr^m6nil developed with 
warmth the idea of the Abb6 Sabattier; and Parliament, carried 
away by his fiery eloquence, made the following declaration : — 

"The Nation, represented by the States-General, alone has the right 
to grant subsidies to the king, the necessity for which must first have 
been clearly demonstrated." 

The emotion was great among serious men and the old council- 
lors. President d'Ormesson, turning to the ardent adversary of the 
court, pronounced in a sad voice these prophetic words, "Take 
care, Monsieur, that Providence does not punish your fatal coun- 
sels by granting your wishes." 



VOL. I. — 22 

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338 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

On August 6 a bed of justice was held at Versailles to have the 
edicts authoritatively registered. On the following day Parliament 
protested, and declared the transaction, which had been cnregis- 
tered, void; it was exiled to Troyes. 

A month later it was recalled. The government oscillated with- 
out ceasing, like a man who is about to fall, incapable of walking 
firmly either along the path of resistance or in that of compromise ; 
it acted with vigour one day only to be timid and retreat the next. 
The struggle soon began. The Due d'Orl^ans, who had taken 
sides with Parliament, was exiled to Villers-Cotteret ; two coun- 
cillors, the Abb<5 Sabattier and Fr^teau, were imprisoned, then 
banished; presently two others, D*£pr^menil and Montsabart, 
were arrested with military parade, and under dramatic circum- 
stances, which struck the popular imagination and aroused all 
minds. Finally on May 8, 1788, at a new bed of justice, the king 
ordered the registration of several edicts, one of which, estab- 
lishing forty-seven great bailiwicks, sensibly modified the juris- 
diction of the Parliaments, and another of which took away from 
them the registration of the laws, to give it to a plenary court. 

The public, violently excited by all of these measures, pro- 
nounced against the ministers; the Due d'Orl^ans, who until 
then had been decried and despised^ became a popular hero ; the 
imprisoned councillors were venerated as martyrs to liberty. 
Troubles broke out on all sides, — in Bretagne, in Dauphine, in 
Provence, in B6arn, in Languedoc. The agitation descended to 
the street. France was on fire. 

Of all the reforms undertaken by Brienne, and the Assembly of 
Notables before their separation, only one perhaps was popular, — 
that ordering changes and retrenchment in the households of the 
king and queen. These changes went into effect on April 19, 
1787. The Life Guards were reduced to four squadrons of two 
hundred and fifty men; the corps of the gendarmerie, the light 
horse, the guards of the gate, were suppressed. The queen was 
most ardent in preaching economy; she greatly regretted that 
the true condition of the treasury had been hidden from her. 
'* If I had known it," she said, '* I should never have made so many 
acquisitions, and I should have been the first to set the example 
of reform in my household ; but how could I form any idea of this 
distress, since when I asked for thirty thousand francs, they sent 
me sixty? " From the opening of the Assembly of the Notables 
she had given up play, and had dismissed the bankers who held 



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RETRENCHMENTS IN THE ROYAL HOUSEHOLD. 339 

it. Three young men who had played despite her prohibition 
were sent back to their regiment. In the month of August the 
economies were more considerable and of greater extent. The 
queen made retrenchments in the number of her horses, in her 
table, in her toilet. She dismissed Mademoiselle Bertin, sus- 
pended work on St. Cloud, gave up her balls, and requested 
the Due de Polignac to hand in his resignation as director-general 
of the post-roads, which had been given him some years before, 
and which they now wished to unite to the letter-post, in the hands 
of Monsieur d'Ogny. The king put down his wolf and boar hunt- 
ing establishments, suppressed the falconry, united his small stable 
with his great, and decided to sell several of the royal houses, such 
as La Muette and Choisy. 

But all these reforms seemed insufficient in the eyes of the 
public; while, on the other hand, they displeased to the last 
degree those who suffered from them, some of whom were not 
able to pay their debts. The Due de Polignac did not give 
up without bitterness an income of fifty thousand francs, nor 
Monsieur de Vaudreuil his place as grand falconer. The Due de 
Coigny, first equerry, made a violent scene before the king; and 
the Baron de Besenval protested that it was frightful to live in a 
country where one was not sure of possessing on the morrow 
what one had to-day. ** One only sees such things in Turkey," 
he said angrily. 

The uproar was increased by seeing Brienne, in the midst of 
these retrenchments, heap upon his own head and those of his 
relatives honours and riches. Under the pretext that the dis- 
turbed situation of the country demanded a single direction of 
the government, he had had himself made principal minister; 
and the Mar^chals de S6gur and de Castries having refused to 
accept subordinate positions under him, he gave the portfolio of 
war to his brother, the Comte de Brienne, — a person of but me- 
diocre talent. On the death of the archbishop of Sens, he ex- 
changed his seat of Toulouse for that of Sens, whose revenues 
were much more considerable; and it was said that a single 
cutting of wood *on one of his estates brought him nine hun- 
dred thousand francs, — exorbitant advantages, which exasperated 
France. 

At the same time, from an exaggerated love of peace, or 
rather in consequence of the disorder in the finances, the min- 
istry, despite the appeals of the Marichal de S^gur, allowed the 



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340 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

patriots of Holland, who were friends and allies of France, to be 
crushed by the stadtholder, who had always been hostile to us, 
and who favoured England and Prussia, — a grave mistake, 
which shook our influence in Europe, and which in France 
added the just complaints of statesmen to those of the soldiers, 
and to the passionate recriminations of the men belonging to the 
court and to the wardrobe. The brilliancy of the embassy sent 
by Tippoo SaTb, and the hope of a useful alliance with India, did 
not suffice to wipe out the disgrace of such a desertion. 

The dissatisfaction with Brienne was universal, and part of this 
discontent recoiled upon the queen. It was she who had made 
the archbishop minister; it was she who maintained him in his 
position. She had, thanks to him, so it was said, entered the 
council; she was held responsible for the resolutions therein 
taken. The truth is, that in face of the general fermentation, of 
the menacing attitude of Parliament, and of the wind of revo- 
lution which was then whistling through all the provinces, the 
queen thought it necessary to bring to the defence of authority 
great consistency of idea and firmness of action. Her natural 
pride inclined her toward energetic measures; but she had not 
resolved upon them without a certain hesitation. While be- 
lieving them useful, she regretted the changes made in the organi- 
zation of Parliament, and she had an extreme repugnance to all 
severity. Her reason thought it necessary, but her kindness 
took alarm. ** It is sad," she wrote, ** to be obliged to resort to 
rigorous measures, of which one cannot previously calculate the 
extent." 

Moreover, inexperienced in government affairs, forced without 
preparation, by the misfortunes of her life and the necessity of 
self-defence, to concern herself with them, from participation in 
which the ministers had previously systematically excluded her; 
possessing great force of character, but ignorant of how to make 
use of it, — it was not she who gave the impulse, but followed it, at 
most giving her assent. But infernal malevolence was implacable 
in regarding her as the author of all evils. They accused her 
of prodigality in connection with Calonne; they accused her of 
despotism in connection with Brienne; odious caricatures and 
abominable placards associated her name with that of Fridi- 
gonde, with Isabeau of Bavaria, with Catherine de M^dicis. A 
correspondent of the archbishop of Lyons denounced her as the 
" invisible power hidden behind the curtain ; " and Parliament 



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THE CONVOCATION OF THE STATES-GENERAL. 34I 

itself, in its remonstrances, dared to say to the king, ** Such meas- 
ures, Sire, do not spring from your heart ; such examples are 
not according to the principles of your Majesty : they come from 
another source." It would have been difficult to designate the 
queen more clearly. When, on March 10, 1792, Vergniaud pro- 
nounced that violent diatribe against Marie Antoinette which 
denounced her to the fury of the populace, he only followed the 
example set four years before by the magistrates who sat beneath 
\h^ fleur-de-lis. 

Thus politics, from which she had instinctively sought to keep 
aloof for so long a time, despite the exhortations of Maria Theresa, 
Mercy, and Joseph II., brought her misfortune as soon as she 
meddled with them. How much happier she would have been 
had she remained in her apartment with her needle-work, as one 
of the musicians of the chapel choir ruefully remarked to her one 
day ! But in the path which necessity had constrained her to 
enter, despite herself, there was no turning back. 

The words which the Abb6 Sabattier let fall, and which had 
been caught up by D*Epr6m^nil, were echoed by the entire 
country. The States-General ! It would seem that this magic 
word alone could give back to weakened and divided France 
peace, riches, and prestige. The Court of the Coadjutors de- 
clared in their turn that they had a better right than any other to 
demand the States-General, since it had been created by them. 
The Assembly of the Clergy demanded the convocation, with brief 
delay, of the States-General, and employing for the first time a 
new language, said to the king, ** The glory of your Majesty lies 
not in being king of France, but in being king of the French." 

The movement was so lively and so universal that Brienne 
thought himself forced to yield to it. A decree of the council of 
July 5*announced the convocation of the States-General, but with- 
out indicating any date. A decree of August 8 fixed it for May i, 
1789. This concession did not appease the public, unanimously 
aroused against the principal minister. They accepted the con- 
vocation of the States-General, but they did not wish to receive 
it from the hands of Brienne. A decree of August 16, declaring 
that until the end of the year all payments of the State should 
be made half in silver and half in notes of the treasury, put the 
finishing touch to the exasperation of the public; they saw 
therein disguised bankruptcy. The archbishop, not knowing 
what to do, but clinging desperately to his power, had the office 



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342 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

of comptroller-general proposed to Necker. It was Mercy, who, 
on the request of the king and queen, became the intermediary 
in this negotiation. Necker replied, as the queen had foreseen, 
that " he would be without power and without means if he were 
associated with a person who unfortunately was distrusted by 
the public, but who, nevertheless, was believed to possess great 
power" He refused to unite his fortune to that of the archbishop. 

What to do? The king had ever an extreme repugnance to 
recall Necker to power ; the queen could not make up her mind 
to sacrifice Brienne, on whose score her eyes were not yet en- 
tirely open. It was necessary, however, under penalty of making 
every reform impossible and every revolt irresistible. The cry 
of the public grew louder and more pressing. The queen sent 
for the minister, and although it cost her something, declared 
that it was necessary to yield before the storm. Always avari- 
cious, Brienne demanded and obtained a cardinal's hat for him- 
self, and for his niece a place as lady of the palace. 

On the following day Marie Antoinette wrote to Necker to 
beg him to come to her: she painted warmly the dangers of the 
situation, the embarrassment of the king, her own grief; she 
made an appeal to his loyalty; and Necker, yielding without 
great difficulty to the eloquence of the queen, after he had been 
assured that he was to be sole minister, accepted a position 
which he was at bottom not sorry to fill. 

Some days after this, the keeper of the seals, Lamoignon, 
whom the public associated with Brienne in the same maledic- 
tion, retired in his turn. 

The joy was great and universal. Necker, on leaving the 
queen's apartments, was received with transports and acclama- 
tions; the galleries of the chiteau, the courts, the streets of 
Versailles, resounded with the cries of, " Long live the king ! " 
** Long live Monsieur Necker ! " The popularity of the sovereign 
was revived by contact with the popularity of the minister. With 
Brienne and Lamoignon dismissed, and Necker recalled, it 
seemed that everything was saved; it was more than joy, it 
was a delirium. And as the French rarely know how to mani- 
fest their sentiments calmly and with measure, the scenes in 
Paris became tumultuous. The archbishop and the keeper of 
the seals were burned in effigy at the foot of the statue of Henri 
IV. People who were passing were arrested ; women were in- 
sulted; houses were pillaged; blood was shed. Strange and 



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POLITICAL BROCHURES. 343 

threatening figures mingled with the crowd. It was no longer 
the explosion of the country's happiness, it was the noisy mani- 
festation of a populace who knew its power and showed it. 

The queen laboured under no delusion ; alone perhaps of those 
about her, she did not share the general confidence; she was 
agitated by gloomy presentiments. ** I tremble," she wrote sor- 
rowfully, " that it should be I who have recalled him, — Necker. 
My lot is to bear misfortune ; and if some infernal machination 
should cause him to fail, or defeat the king s authority, they will 
detest me still more." 

The queen was right. A clever financier, but a mediocre poli- 
tician, Necker was not equal to the task he had undertaken. 
Would he have succeeded better in dissipating the peril if he 
had been in power fifteen months earlier? He said so, and his 
daughter wrote it; but it is possible to doubt it. Necker was, 
perhaps, a good comptroller-general ; he was incapable of being 
prime minister. He was a financier, and not a statesman. 
Always concerned for his popularity, he sought measures that 
would please, rather than those that might save. Without large 
views, without any fixed plan or precise idea of the redoubtable 
question whose solution rested with him, he foresaw nothing and 
prevented nothing. The more the king determined to yield up 
his prerogative, the more important it became that his authority 
should seem to be strong and incontestable. Necker never took 
the initiative, nor possessed that vigour of conception and 01 
action which allows of no deviation; in place of directing a 
movement, he was content to follow it. That physician, who, 
according to Joseph H., was to save France, had no remedy to 
propose. 

Brienne, in the edict which promised the convocation of the 
States-General, had engaged not only the municipalities and the 
tribunals, but also all philosophers and learned persons, to make 
researches, and to give their advice on the organization of that 
great Assembly. Floods of brochures appeared, setting forth 
the ideas of any one who could hold a pen, developing the most 
abstract theories, and often the strangest systems, with an abso- 
lute disdain of history and a complete ignorance of the necessities 
of a government, as if France were a new territory, where there 
were no traditions and no customs to be taken into consideration. 
It was no longer the liberty, but the license of the Press. The 
Comte d'Entraigues, who was to be one of the most ardent 



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344 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

agents of the Revolution, in his memoir on the States-General 
attacked the monarchy, glorified the republic, represented the 
French as a troop of slaves, and wrote this phrase, which was an 
appeal to insurrection: ** There is no sort of disorder which is 
not preferable to the fatal tranquillity procured by absolute 
power." Sieyfes, in a brochure which is still celebrated, pro- 
claimed that the Third Estate was nothing in France, whereas it 
should be everything, — a bold sophism, disproved by history, 
for the Third Estate has always played, and plays still, a con- 
siderable rdle; but like all sophisms, condensed into a simple 
and specioas formula, it was accepted as a revelation and 
received as a truth. 

Every question was broached ; all sorts of ideas started ; every 
Utopia found an apostle. 

"The fermentation is general," an attentive obsen^er wrote. "One 
hears nothing talked of but constitutions ; the women, in particular, take 
part in the movement, and you know, as I do, their influence in this coun- 
try. It is a veritable delirium ; every one is an administrator, and talks 
of progress. In the antechambers the lackeys are occupied in reading 
the brochures which appear ; every day ten or twelve new ones are pub- 
lished, and I do not understand how there are printers enough. At this 
moment it is the fashionable question ; and you know as well as I the sway 
of fashion here." 

In the midst of this wave which threatened to submerge every- 
thing, the good sense of the public was uncertain, and needed a 
guide; it did not find one. Necker was not less uncertain and 
adrift than the public. Twenty problems presented themselves 
which demanded a prompt and decisive solution. The States- 
General were to be assembled, that was a fixed fact. But where 
should they assemble? What should be their composition? 
What questions should be submitted to them? What rights 
should they have? What should be the duration of the session? 
Could one rely in such serious questions on writers without a 
mission, and on legislators without experience? Was not the first 
duty of the minister to examine the situation carefully and calmly 
himself; to surround himself with enlightened counsellors; to 
listen to the wishes of the public without allowing himself to be 
carried away by its wild impatience ; to have a conviction himself 
on each point in dispute, and having once formed that conviction, 
to make an energetic and irrevocable decision, — in a word, to have 



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VARIOUS PLANS. 345 



a determined goal, and to march toward it with a firm step? 
Necker was not equal to it. During the whole of the latter 
part of the year 1788, he allowed the discussion, to be continued, 
minds to become agitated, and opinion to become inflamed. 
Then, not knowing what to do in the midst of so much contradic- 
tory advice, he had the strange idea after the recent sad experi- 
ence of recalling the Notables to submit to them all these questions. 
This was to avow that he had no plans himself, and what was 
worse, no will. As before, the Notables separated after having 
only augmented the confusion. 

It was necessary, however, to adopt some course ; arid the first 
point to decide was the city wherein the Assembly of the States- 
General should take place. Necker proposed Paris, or Versailles, 
which offered an equal number of disadvantages with Paris ; the 
queen desired a city forty or fifty leagues from the capital, — 
Orleans, or Tours, or even Rheims, Lyons, or Bordeaux. She 
realized how necessary it was that for such an assembly to pre- 
serve its liberty, it should be separated from a centre of agita- 
tion and revolution like Paris, which was always ready for a riot, 
always disposed to impose its will by means of a numerous mob, 
and by reason of this numerous mob, easy to influence. But 
Necker represented the expenditure which the displacement of 
the court would necessitate; his opinion prevailed. The king, 
in order to be nearer the States-General, decided that they should 
meet at Versailles. 

But a more serious question, and one which had more passion- 
ately aroused public opinion, presented itself. This was the rep- 
resentation of the Third Estate. Should this representation be 
double that of the other two orders? When Parliament had regis- 
tered the edict of the convocation of the States-General, it had 
added the clause that they should be held with all the forms used 
in 1614; but many changes had occurred since 1614. The impor- 
tance of the first two orders had diminished ; while that of the third, 
on the other hand, had greatly increased. In the provincial as- 
semblies, the number of deputies from the Third Estate equalled 
the number of deputies from the clergy and the noblesse combined. 
The greater number of the publicists demanded that the same 
rule should apply to the States-General as to the provincial as- 
semblies ; and the declaration of Parliament immediately lessened 
the popularity of that great body, which had hitherto been valued 
for its resistance, often factious, to the royal authority. It was 



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34^ LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

on Dec. 27, 1788, that the government pronounced its opinion. 
Marie Antoinette was present at the council; the double repre- 
sentation of the Third Estate was agreed upon. The king from 
a feeling of justice, the queen from the same sentiment and 
also from distrust of the first two orders, whose opposition had 
more than once created such great embarrassment in the govern- 
ment during the last two years, and Necker from his love of popu- 
larity, had agreed upon this decision ; but Necker assumed all 
the credit of it. By a strange neglect of decorum, an act of this 
importance was published without preamble; it only said that 
the king, after having studied the report of his minister of finance, 
had adopted the principle. Thus Necker had, in the eyes of the 
public, all the merit and all the credit of this popular measure ; 
the monarch was thrown fnto the shade, in order to heighten the 
brilliancy of the all-powerful minister, — a singular manner of ele- 
vating the majesty and authority of the throne in the eyes of the 
populace. But Necker only listened to his own extreme vanity, 
which veiled his real insufficiency before his own eyes and the 
eyes of the masses. According to the saying of one of tlie histo- 
rians who has shown the greatest impartiality in judging the con- 
duct of the Genevan financier at this time, *' He played the r61e 
of king because he was impotent to fulfil the part of minister.'* 

Another decision of cardinal importance — that of the vote by 
order or by head — was left to the decision of the States, who 
thus were charged, by a fatal mistake or blind lack of foresight, 
with the making of their own rules and the direction of their 
own work. 

The noblesse were indignant with the queen for the part she 
had taken in this affair. It was her destiny to be held respon- 
sible for everything. The princes of the blood sent to the king 
by the Comte d'Artois a protest against this increase of the Third 
Estate; and the prince made the most lively representations to 
his sister-in-law concerning her preference for the Third Estate, 
and on the necessity of upholding the noblesse. The queen 
listened to him without interruption, but her sentiments were not 
changed. This was the signal between Marie Antoinette and her 
brother-in-law for an estrangement which had been preparing for 
some time, and which the years that followed but increased. 
The Polignacs took sides with the Comte d'Artois, and the bonds 
of friendship, already greatly relaxed, threatened to break, as 
well as family ties. 



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DE PROVENCE COVERTLY ATTACKS HER. 347 



Alas! it was not long before the unfortunate woman found 
only enemies ta the royal family, and the most implacable were 
those on the very steps of the throne. Of a cold and calculating 
disposition, the Comte de Provence had always been looked upon 
with suspicion by Marie Antoinette. On several occasions he 
had sought to draw near her from policy. He had given her a 
magnificent entertainment in his house of Brunoy, with the most 
ingenious and gallant diversions ; he had accompanied her to the 
balls at the opera ; he had even gone so far as to write verses in 
her honour; and one day, having broken a fan of which the 
queen was very fond, he had hastened to send her another with 
this quatrain : — 

"In the midst of a heat one can scarcely support 

For your comfort I seek to provide. 
My care is the Zephyrs to call to your side ; 

The Loves of themselves come unsought" 

But this intimacy was only apparent, and on the part of Mon- 
sieur entirely the result of calculation. Ambitious and eager to 
play a r61e, clever and distinguished, feeling himself, moreover, 
the superior of Louis XVI., he regarded it as a mistake, and 
almost as an insult on the part of Nature, that he should not have 
been the first-born. " His grief," the queen wrote, ** all his life, 
has been not to be master." During the journeys that he had 
made to the centre of France in 1787, he had exhibited an 
almost royal magnificence and equipage, posing almost as a 
pretender, as if seeking to eclipse the king and to attract to 
himself, to the detriment of the sovereign, the regards and affec- 
tions of the people. " If Monsieur de Maurepas were not such a 
softling," Joseph II. said energetically, ** one could not conceive 
how he could allow such things." The power of the queen had 
overthrown her brother-in-law. He accused her of having hin- 
dered him from entering the council, and could not pardon her 
for it. He could pardon her still less for her tardy maternity, 
which had closed to him the prospect of the throne at the very 
moment when he was beginning to believe it assured to him. 
Publicly, and before her, he made the best of it; but behind 
her back, and in secret, he tore her to pieces. Criticisms, per- 
siflage, epigrams, calumnies, libels, petty verses and brochures^ — 
he spared nothing; and his palace, the Luxembourg, exempt 
by its privileges from all police researches, became the store- 
house of the libels and pamphlets which flooded Versailles 



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348 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

and Paris. In the conflicts of the minister and Parliament, the 
prince had openly declared for Parliament, seeking to found his 
reputation for liberalism in opposition to the court and at the 
expense of the authority of the king, and to crush by his popu- 
larity the unpopularity of his sister-in-law and the nonentity of 
his brother. The statesman in him was still only in embrj-o; 
the hard experience of exile was necessary to mature it. 

Designing like her husband, Italian in both mind and body, 
of mediocre intelligence, of a deceitful and reserved character, 
Madame had no more sympathy for the queen than Monsieur. 
The two sisters-in-law had at first lived together frankly but 
coldly, without quarrels, without confidence; but soon distrust 
had intervened. There was no open rupture, but only secret 
hostility. Without influence at court, possessing none over her 
husband, who deserted her for Madame de Baldi, looked upon 
with disfavour by the king, little loved by those about her, often 
exhibiting a want of tact, living apart and concerning herself 
almost exclusively with her farm and her kitchen, Madame was 
not a redoubtable enemy for the queen ; but she made a voice 
the more in the concert of recriminations and malevolent rancour 
raised against her. 

The Comte d'Artois, who was gay, lively, well made, and fond 
of pleasure, was for a long time one of Marie Antoinette's inti- 
mates. He was the organizer of her diversions, the habitual host 
at Trianon, the favourite of the Polignac set. In this role he was 
one of those on whom history has laid the greatest responsibility 
for the dissipation and frivolity which for a time carried away the 
queen. The races, the play, the balls, all those entertainments 
which we have mentioned above, originated with the Comte d'Ar- 
tois. This community of amusements had not a little contrib- 
uted toward drawing upon the young sovereign (who, however, 
had but a mediocre liking for her brother-in-law) a share of the 
unpopularity of that prince, who was undoubtedly amiable, but 
who was petulant, haughty, prodigal, and contemptuous of the 
opinion of the public. Age, reflection, experience, and the purer 
joys and more austere cares of maternity had diminished an 
intimacy which only rested in reality upon a need of distrac- 
tion and the fear of being bored. The opposition which the 
Comte d'Artois had shown to Necker's reforms, the support 
which he had given to Calonne, the part which he had taken in 
the fall of Brienne, the memoir which he had handed to the 



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MADAME ELISABETH. 349 

king concerning the increase of the Third Estate, succeeded in 
estranging him completely from his sister-in-law. The thirst of 
pleasure had for a moment united them ; the cares of more seri- 
ous occupations separated them ; politics divided them, and was 
to divide them still further. 

Of the Comtesse d'Artois, who was good and sweet, but an 
absolute nonentity, we have nothing to say. No one paid any 
attention to her at court, and her husband least of all. In the 
beginning, her repeated pregnancy, in face of the sterility of the 
queen and Madame, had given her a certain importance. The 
birth of the dauphin had thrown her into obscurity again. ** It 
would be necessary for that poor little princess to die in order to 
make any one think of her," Madame de Bombelles wrote at a 
time when the countess was very ill of a malignant fever. Such 
was the opinion of the court, and that of the public ; and if the 
princess had then died, such would probably have been her 
funeral oration. 

The only one of her sisters-in-law for whom Marie Antoinette 
felt any real sympathy was Madame Elisabeth. She had soon 
learned to value that young girl, whose gay spirit, decided char- 
acter, naive grace, and exquisite sensibility touched her. ** I 
fear," she wrote to her mother, " to grow too fond of her." The 
years had only made this attraction stronger; and the almost in- 
stinctive affection which a lovable child inspires had given place 
to the more serious affection which springs from an esteem for 
solid and profound qualities. The young princess's taste for a 
tranquil life and for friendship, her repugnance to pomp and 
pretension, had perhaps also contributed to increase the friend- 
ship of the queen, who shared these inclinations and repugnances. 
When Marie Antoinette went to Trianon, she always took her 
young sister-in-law with her, and there surrounded her with the 
most delicate attentions, prepared the most charming surprises 
for her, associated her in her pleasures, made her play a r61e in 
the "Gageure Impr^vue," took her to St. Cyr, to Rambouillet, to 
La Muette, to Bellevue, to St. Cloud, to the hunt, to the play, 
gave her even a larger share in her distress and disquietude, and 
implored her aid in caring for her sick children. During a time, 
notably in 1781, one would have said that the two sisters-in-law 
were inseparable. The queen had wished that Madame Elisabeth 
should also have her own house. She had induced the king to buy 
the house of the Prince de Guem^nie at Montreuil; and one day, 



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350 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

without saying anything, she conducted her young sister-in-law 
thither. ** You are in your own home/' she said to her; ** this is 
to be your Trianon. The king, who takes pleasure in presenting 
it to you, has allowed me the pleasure of apprising you of it." 

What is strange, however, is that this affection was not recip- 
rocal ; where the queen yielded herself entirely, Madame Elisa- 
beth preserved a certain reserve, which resembled mistrust, and 
in a letter which she wrote at that time, allowed herself to say, 
** Our opinions differ; she is an Austrian, and I am a Bourbon." 
The school of misfortune was needed to open her eyes, and show 
the queen to her in her true light. She understood th^n the 
queen's real worth, and reproached herself for having misjudged 
her for a time; the hesitating friend of Trianon became the 
devoted companion of the Temple. 

An Austrian ! This word alone reveals the instigator of the 
prejudices which for a time estranged the affection of Madame 
Elisabeth from the queen. Between the two sisters-in-law, so well 
formed to understand each other, the fatal influence of Madame 
Addalde had risen like a malevolent fairy. During the last 
hours of the monarchy, as at the beginning of the reign, the 
old princess preserved against the queen, already so unfortunate, 
the obstinate dislike with which she had hounded her as dauphin- 
ess and as the adored sovereign. In her retirement at Bellevue, 
whence she rarely departed, embittered by age and by her iso- 
lation, she gathered with malevolent joy all the insinuations 
against Marie Antoinette, — the pamphlets, the satires, the com- 
plots, the equivocal anecdotes, which those who wished to pay 
their court to her hastened to bring her. Champcenetz and the 
Marquis de Louvois were the usual purveyors of this honest 
coterie; and thence pamphlets, songs, anecdotes, reviewed, cor- 
rected, and annotated, were sent forth to amuse the court, to 
scandalize the city, to embitter public opinion, and if possible, 
to prejudice the king against his wife. Madame Adelaide had 
even dared one day, on July 12, 1788, to go to her nephew and 
lay before him with acrimonious passion her grievances against 
the queen; the attack had failed, despite the support which, 
from her retreat at St. Denys, Madame Louise had lent it; and 
the king had dryly begged his aunt not to quit Bellevue again. 
But we can imagine that this check had not appeased the ran- 
cour of the old maid ; during the end of the reign, Bellevue, 
which Madame owed to a delicate attention on the part of her 



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THE DUC D'ORLfiANS. 35' 

niece, became the scene of all the intrigues against Marie 
Antoinette. 

It was to Bellevue that the Prince de Cond6 went to receive 
new inspiration before accompanying Madame Adelaide when 
she went to denounce the queen to her husband. It was to 
Bellevue again that he went to revive his hatred against the 
young sovereign. A valiant warrior, prodigal hy taste and by 
the tradition of his race, but of a narrow mind and violent char- 
acter, a sufficiently bad head of the family, moreover, the Prince 
de Cond6 was immoderate in everything he did, in his passions 
as in his rancour. Blindly attached to the ancient French policy, 
he could not pardon Marie Antoinette her Austrian origin. He 
pardoned her still less for opposing the person whom he had 
named as chief master of the artillery, and for having refused to 
allow Madame de Monaco, his friend, to appear before her, 
declaring that she would not receive women who were separated 
from their husbands. The trial of the Cardinal de Rohan had 
added another pretext to his complaints ; and from that time the 
prince had ranged himself among the most inveterate enemies 
of the queen. 

His son, the Due de Bourbon, had no personal grievance against 
Marie Antoinette. In the affair which made so much noise — his 
duel with the Comte d* Artois — the queen had shown no prefer- 
ence; but the lover of fifteen years, who was so soon disloyal, 
forgot his incessant quarrels with his father, in order to share his 
prejudices. 

Despised at court, despised by the public, the brother-in-law of 
the Due de Bourbon, the Due d'Orl^ans, had only been able to re- 
gain a little favour by declaring himself the queen's enemy. What 
had led him to do this? Was it disappointed ambition, wounded 
vanity, dreams of illegitimate grandeur? A little of all these, 
perhaps. He has been represented as a persevering and clever 
conspirator, pushing his way to the throne by shady machina- 
tions; but this is an error. Of a noble bearing and distinguished 
air, preserving in the midst of his gross irregularities an attractive 
manner and elegant dress, but light-minded, of a weak character, 
incapable of sustained attention to anything serious, idle and indo- 
lent to excess, the Due d'0rl6ans had no quality that could make 
him the chief of a party. His dissolute life, which was but too evi- 
dent in his face, his infidelity to his wife, — the pious daughter of 
the Due de Penthi^vre, — his orgies at Monceaux, his cynical 



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352 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

tone, destroyed all his influence ; but his title as first prince of the 
blood and his immense fortune made him a dangerous instrument 
in the hands of clever intriguers. While he was still only Due de 
Chartres, he had begun by paying court to the queen ; he had 
given her balls at the Palais Royal, organized with the Comte 
jJi'Artois, then his companion in pleasure, horse-races in her honour, 
frequented sedulously the salon of his sister-in-law, the Princesse 
de Lamballe, the queen's favourite. The latter at that epoch 
showed her young cousin marked favour: she obtained for him 
the government of Poitou ; two years later she had him made 
colonel-general of hussars, and had even exhibited in the pur- 
suit of this nomination such warmth as to displease the public, 
which was at that time strongly indisposed toward the prince. 

This appointment was made shortly after the battle of Oues- 
sant. The condtict of the Due de Chartres in that affair had 
given rise to lively recriminations, and even to dishonourable 
suspicions; to-day, when we can better judge of this affair, 
because of our greater knowledge and freedom from passion, 
it is certain that if the bravery of the prince cannot be called in 
question, his capacity as a sailor cannot be established. The 
queen had sought in this appointment an honourable means of 
retiring him from the marine ; but this was not what the duke 
desired, as he had aspired to the position of chief admiral. Dis- 
satisfied with the new title given to him, wounded in his privileges 
as prince of the blood during the journey of the Archduke Maxi- 
milian, he withdrew from the court, and from that time joined 
the cabal hostile to the queen. Did the latter avenge herself for 
his ill-justified susceptibility by repeating some of the cutting 
pleasantries to which the behaviour of the commander of the 
Blue Squadron had given rise? The chroniclers of the time 
aver it, and it does not seem improbable. 

Despite her extreme good-nature, Marie Antoinette could not 
always resist the temptation of listening to or saying something 
witty. There arose consequently a war of underhand intrigues 
and perfidious machinations on the part of the prince, of piquant 
raillery on the part of the queen, — a war seemingly inoffensive 
in the beginning (for what danger was there to fear from a 
man whose morals all Paris decried, and whose military exploits 
and industrial enterprises the court made sport of?), — until the 
day when the prince, piqued by a remark that his instincts were 
mercantile rather than princely, irritated at the failure of the mar- 



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THE CONDITION OF FRANCE. 353 

riage he had planned between his son and Madame Royale, and 
instigated, furthermore, by the worthy companions of his pleasure 
(the Laclos, the Lauzuns, the Sillerys), burst forth suddenly in 
full Parliament on Nov. 19, 1787, while the king was holding a sol- 
emn session, to demand the registration of a loan of four hundred 
and twenty millions, with, " This registration is illegal/' This vio- 
lent outbreak brought upon him the king's displeasure, who was the 
more justly incensed as he had just accorded him a much-desired 
permission, but gained for him as compensation the favour of the 
public — which was at first surprised at this vigorous measure — 
and the good-will of Madame Adelaide. This prudish and pious 
princess openly took sides with the libertine prince, who put at 
the service of the rancour of the old maid the name of D'Orl^ans 
and the fortune of the Penthi^vres. 

Exiled to Villers-Cotteret, the duke did not sustain with much 
constancy his r61e as chief of the party; he had neither sufficient 
audacity nor courage for it. At the end of a few months, weary of 
his exile, regretting the pleasures of Monceaux, and eager to see 
Madame Buffon again, he solicited the queen for permission to 
return to Paris, or at least to reside nearer to it. At that moment, 
when the circumstances were so solemn, Marie Antoinette, who 
was ever disposed to clemency, listened to Madame de Lamballe, 
and despite her repugnance, yielded to the wishes of her friend. 
The duke was allowed to repair to his chateau of Raincy, and thus 
added to his former grievances against Marie Antoinette a griev- 
ance the more, — that of gratitude. The opposition to the court 
and the enemies of the queen had for the future a nominal chief, 
and this chief was the first prince of the blood. 

A royal family divided against itself; a king who was anxious 
for the good of his people, but who was weak, undecided, dis- 
couraged ; a queen who was valiant, but lacking in experience, 
and the object of popular hatred ; a self-sufficient minister, with- 
out plan or direction; a feverish public opinion which was as 
dangerous by reason of its ill-considered hopes as its unjust sus- 
picions; an exhausted treasury ; a malevolent capital ; the coun- 
try scarce recovered from its recent disturbances; an army in 
which the seeds of disorganization were already sown; every- 
where means of attack, nowhere any means of defence ; and as if 
Nature herself conspired with men to destroy the old monarchical 
edifice, a terrible winter following a bad summer; the rivers 
frozen, the roads blocked with snow, rendering it difficult to 
VOL. I. — 23 

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354 LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE. 

provision Paris ; the water-mills unable to run, and thus stopping 
the grinding of grain; the scarcity adding real suffering to the 
vague disquietude ; famine furnishing astonishing facility for every 
intrigue, and specious pretexts for indignation, — it was under such 
circumstances and with such guides that France approached the 
most formidable crisis that she had ever met in her history. 



END OF VOL, L 



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